Scottish Youth Hostels Association

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The Scottish Youth Hostels Association (SYHA), founded in 1931, is part of Hostelling International and provides youth hostel accommodation in Scotland. It claims over 30,000 current members, and is used by many visitors from outwith Scotland.

The principal objective of the Association is: 'To help all, but especially young people, to experience and appreciate the Scottish countryside and places of historic and cultural interest in Scotland, and to promote their health, recreation and education, particularly by providing low cost accommodation for them on their travels.'

The current handbook lists nearly 70 hostels; some independently owned such as those of the Gatliff Hebridean Hostel Trust. Hostels vary from modern purpose-built premises to historic buildings and country cottages, sited in major towns and cities and in rural locations, including remote islands. The atmosphere varies greatly from one hostel to another, affected as it is by factors such as the location (from the Highlands and Islands to the bustle of Edinburgh), and the personality of the warden.

Accommodation is generally dormitory-style but increasingly this is being subdivided into smaller units. For example, the most modern hostel, Edinburgh Central, has many single and twin-bedded rooms with ensuite facilities. All have a lounge/sitting room, shared bathrooms and self-catering kitchens. A few large hostels provide meals.

The SYHA is run as a self-governing voluntary organisation, and as a not-for-profit business invests any surplus back into the organisation, both to develop the network and to improve older hostels. Today it faces strong competition from the more numerous independent hostels, and from rural hotels which provide bunkhouse accommodation. Changing demand and limited resources have led to the closure of hostels which had been failing to attract visitors, but hostels nowadays provide facilities undreamt of in the more spartan days of half a century or more ago. Both as well as the cost of accommodation have proved controversial, but for many the hostels continue to do a good job of providing reasonably priced facilities with the bonus of the opportunity to socialise with other hostellers.

It has been claimed that it has left its roots as a working class movement to "provide accommodation to people of limited means" behind, and become too expensive. The SYHA's defenders, including Allan Wilson MSP, point out that hostellers today require higher levels of comfort than when the hostelling movement began ^[1].

In September 2007, the SYHA released a Hostel Network and Management Review (http://www.syha.org.uk/SYHA/Web/Site/NewsEventsOffers/NetworkReviewandHostelClosures.asp) The report recommends closing nine hostels and a management restructure. This will result in a large number of hostel managers facing redundancy and the loss of their accommodation, as well as having a negative effect on the economy of local communities.