What’s the point of twinning towns and cities?

You’ll often see a proud sign telling you where a place is twinned with as you head in, ‘Welcome to Dull, Perthshire. Paired with Boring, Oregon, USA’.

Perth and Kinross Council estimate that Dull with a population of 85, brings in about 60,000 visitors a year – with a fair number of visitors coming from Boring, and another twinned town Bland in New South Wales, Australia. They’re making the most of their place names and the mutually beneficial connection they can create from this, holding a celebration of their twinning on the 9th of August every year.

Twinning links are legal or social agreements between two cities, towns or villages, to boost trade and tourism, promote peace and cultural exchange. In 1920 Keighley made history as the first UK town to twin with another, Keighley soldiers who’d been stationed in Poix-du-Nord, France, during WWI, saw the devastation wrought on the battle-scarred town and implored Keighley council to draw up a town twinning agreement as an official gesture of solidarity. Twinning got a boost in 1945, when mayors and citizens alike were determined more than ever to prevent Europe from being torn apart by war. The UK has approximately 2,000 formal twinning agreements.

Is there a point to twinning, and are towns and cities in the UK making the most of their twin towns, with European neighbours post-Brexit and further afield?

People can communicate, travel and migrate to all corners of the world and learn and explore any culture they want to, but twin towns create opportunities for citizens and town and city officials to experience another culture and learn from their way of doing things. Which in turn is good for fostering business connections and mutually beneficial economic partnerships. Twinning is a long-term relationship between the people in these two places. However, depends on the funding that local authorities have in their budget for twinning activities, and whether these relationships are nurtured.

In 1998, Leeds twinned in solidarity with the newly-liberated Durban, South Africa, after years of anti-apartheid struggles. Twinning was said to be a natural step following years of vocal campaigning against apartheid in the city. While the Durban link has been inactive for some time, Leeds’ link with Lille, France, was revived due to Lille’s experience in urban planning around the introduction of the Eurostar. With HS2 development, Leeds International Relations team said that Lille provided “the perfect example” to learn from. Many towns looked to their twins for best practice in Covid recovery and German town Schwäbisch Gmünd officials sent over personal protective equipment to their twin town of Barnsley during Covid after hearing that supplies were low.

Havana and Glasgow have been twinned for over 20 years, spearheaded in 2002 by Glasgow’s then Lord Provost Alex Mosson, who has said that there was a special affection for Cuba at the time, as with the USSR’s dissolution, Cuba was experiencing significant economic decline. Music, medicine and business were other key reasons for the partnership, equipment was gifted at the time to a Havana film college and some years later, the Glasgow Havana Film Festival (now in its 9th year) has come from this twinning partnership. Kyiv Council has recently praised Edinburgh, twin city for over 30 years, on their show of support and help in finding 10,000 displaced Ukrainians a place to stay in Kyiv’s twin city following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Modernised twinning partnerships, twinning serving as a tool for towns and cities facing mutual issues could prove useful. Issues such as water management, waste recycling, the improvement of social services, or knowledge exchanges. Learning from how their twin cities are managing issues, both locally and globally, and using these practices in Scotland.

It’s up to local authorities to decide if they want to fund activities with twinned towns, but under increasing budget constraints, it might be enough to ensure that communities in their towns and cities know who they’re twinned with, and how communities can make the most of strengthening these connections. Promoting ideas on their local authority websites for how people can get involved with twin towns and cultural exchanges for schools, colleges, community groups and business links.

Local authorities should make the most of the tourism, business and knowledge exchange potential, to grow the economies of communities, like Perth and Kinross Council and the tourism that twinning brings for them. I will definitely be visiting Dull, and may as well add Boring and Bland to my travel list too, to hit the full ‘Trinity of Tedium’ – their twinning words, not mine!