Are they taking the Mickey with £20k ‘wizard’s hat’ Christmas decoration?
THEY were no doubt hoping to conjure up the magic of Christmas.
But councillors seem to have taken the idea a little too literally – with a bizarre decoration resembling a sorcerer’s hat.
Locals are now demanding the blue coneshaped ‘tree’, which has also been likened to a nuclear warhead, be taken down.
A petition demanding the ‘embarrassing eyesore’ be removed has already attracted more than 100 signatures.
Some have threatened to boycott tomorrow night’s switching-on of the lights in Birstall, Leicestershire, unless the 26ft plastic tree – which could end up costing the council £20,000 – goes.
Simon Sansome, a former district councillor, launched the petition after being contacted by residents.
Mr Sansome, who lives in nearby Glenfield, said: ‘It’s absolutely revolting. It looks like Harry Potter’s hat. They have basically spent thousands of pounds on a blue Christmas decoration. It’s just disgusting. At first glance you struggle to see what it has to do with Christmas. Even more annoyingly there is a garden centre selling traditional Christmas trees just across the road for £50.’
The Birstall ‘tree’, which features white stars, has been hired for three years, at a cost of £6,196 per year, plus £2,600 in storage fees. It follows complaints that last
‘Wanted to do something different’
year’s real Christmas tree was too small. Council Clerk Sue Coulson said it was paid for through ‘unused election costs funds’.
But the tree has not gone down well, with some comparing it to Mickey Mouse’s wizard’s hat from the Disney film ‘Fantasia’. Caroline Perez posted on Facebook: ‘It seems revolting and has no place in our village. We need a real tree! Considering we pay for it at least let us have a say!’
But Ann Marshall, Chairman of the parish council, said: ‘You would think we were hanging people in the village square, the way people have reacted to this.
‘We just wanted to do something different after the criticism we got last year.’
The sense of ill feeling in Birstall was in contrast to the reception afforded to a family’s ‘lighthouse’ in Bristol, which attracted hundreds of onlookers to its own big switch-on this week.
Lee and Paul Brailsford have spent £10,000 decorating their mother Rosemary’s house in Brentry, steadily increasing their display each year since 1994 to raise money for charity.
They have raised more than £30,000 for Bristol Royal Hospital for Children.
The lights – all 50,000 bulbs – will be illuminated for six hours a day for 31 days at a cost of £600.