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👋 Good morning! It’s Saturday 22 August 2026. I’m Neil McIntosh, editor of The Early Line, and it’s great to have you here.
📣 You’re reading the weekend edition of The Early Line. Paying subscribers get the full version, with six talking points and film, TV and sporting recommendations for the weekend.
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Have a wonderful weekend, all!
☀️ The weekend’s weather: It’s a dry, pleasant day for Glasgow, Edinburgh and Dundee and Aberdeen and Inverness. Tomorrow is much the same, although with a slightly greater threat of rain later in the north east. London is set for a mild, dry weekend - much cooler than of late. (Here’s the UK forecast).
SIX THINGS TO TALK ABOUT
Edinburgh’s festivals fret for their future | What (new) class are you? | Male grief | How to reheat food and not get ill | Why Aberdeen Angus is back on the menu | A property that’ll be home, and your business
🍸 Edinburgh’s in peak festival season: even as the Party Line travelled through the city centre first thing this morning*, visitors were up and about, the billboards were festooned with shows and (for the best ones) their all-important Scotsman star ratings, and some weary-looking hospitality workers were prepping for another long, hectic day.
But portions of this city have a famously ambivalent attitude towards the festival: the way it gums up the pavements, the people it encourages to come, the noise. The festivals might be older than almost anyone alive here, but some locals still tut at their annual imposition.
That attitude appears to seep out through the city’s council, which has yet to fully decide what it’ll do with the £50 million visitor levy windfall it has awarded itself.
When originally proposed, the levy was expected to support city infrastructure, local services, housing, and cultural events.
The council has already decided to spend (although it insists on using the term “invest”) the equivalent of £30 million a year for the next three years on policing, CCTV and bins. A further £5 million is going on housing. A portion - 35% - of the remainder is earmarked for culture, including the festivals.
So how much, exactly, should the festivals get? It was due to be discussed by councillors earlier this month, but the hearing was delayed at the last minute on an apparent technicality. It’s been rescheduled for next week, just as they begin to wrap up their 2026 programmes.
As the FT reports today (£), they’re desperate for an improvement on council funding, which has been static for some time. The festivals claim to bring a fortune into the city: half a million visitors all told. The Fringe says it’s the world’s third-biggest event by tickets sold, after the World Cup and Olympics, and brings £500 million into the city all by itself.
The challenge, it appears, is that a lot of the value is secured by landlords and others distant from the art itself. The festival organisations live a surprisingly precarious existence - hence the urgency on funding.
Do local attitudes cause a problem? The Fringe Society’s Tony Lankester suggests so. He tells the FT: “If you are serious about Edinburgh being one of the world’s greatest cultural capitals, you need to invest in the things that prove that. Edinburgh hasn’t got that right.
“We know it is not universally loved, and I think that might sometimes stop councillors taking the positive investment decisions needed.” (Financial Times (£))
*Which explains the late arrival of your Party Line. Apologies…
Upgrade to read the full Party Line, including
A new class calculator from the Telegraph - where do you fall?
A psychologist delves into the grief of apparently successful men
How to reheat food and not get ill
Why Aberdeen Angus is back on the menu
A property that’ll be home, and your business.
PLUS: find top TV, film and sporting picks for the weekend, including all the TV fixtures for the English Premier League, which kicked off last night.
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