Inverness’ Red Hot Highland Fling Hogmanay event permanently scrapped

Inverness’ Red Hot Highland Fling has been scrapped, says Highland Council.

The celebration was billed as Scotland’s biggest free Hogmanay concert and drew crowds of up to 10,000 people, before ticketing was later introduced and numbers restricted to about 5,000.

The city has hosted a public Hogmanay event since 2008.

Last year’s Red Hot Highland Fling did not go ahead due to funding and capacity issues, and now Highland Council has said it had been cancelled permanently.

The local authority said Inverness Events and Festivals Working Group had confirmed the city’s common good fund could no longer support and run a public Hogmanay event.

Inverness provost Glynis Sinclair said: “Sadly, we have come to the end of an era of the Red Hot Highland Fling Hogmanay Event.

“It is with regret that we confirm that this major event in the Inverness Events and Festivals programme will no longer feature on the winter festival calendar of events.”

She said the working group had worked with hospitality businesses to try and come up with a new event.

The provost added: “Unfortunately, no proposals were forthcoming and therefore there is no longer the justification to invest funds from the Inverness Common Good Fund into a Hogmanay event.”

The Red Hot Highland Fling was held in the Northern Meeting Park on the city’s Riverside.