Glasgow tourism chiefs hit back after Thomas Cook guide describes city as 'deprived'

The guide, which is on sale in both Britain and the US, paints a bleak picture of Scotland’s largest city.

One section reads: 'Well-meant efforts to re-house the city's workers in the 1950s and 1960s often backfired, with new housing estates such as Easterhouse displaying many of the same intractable social problems as the city's slums.'

And continues: 'Drug and alcohol abuse and violent crime remain an issue in Glasgow's deprived suburbs even today.'

Modernisation: The Scottish Exhibition Centre is one of the key attractions of the rejuvenated Glasgow city centre

Scott Taylor, chief executive of Glasgow City Marketing Bureau attacked the recently updated guide for portraying an unbalanced viewpoint.

'We’re not sure whether this is in fact a guidebook or an opportunity to knock Glaswegians.' He told the Glasgow Herald.

'I think Glasgow has come a long way. It is now one of the world’s leading tourist cities. It has an enormous amount of wealth and opportunity for tourists to come and see, so to describe places in Glasgow as ‘rubbish’ is just awful.'

Since its glory days during the height of the industrial revolution - when Glasgow rose to become the fourth biggest city in Europe after London, Paris and Berlin - the city spent a number of years in severe decline as Britain’s industrial empire was dismantled.

However, the city has put in an enormous effort  to shrug off its image as a post-industrial metropolis in decline culminating in Glasgow winning the right to be the European Capital of Culture in 1990. In the two decades since, it has continued to rebuild it’s image as a  modern, cosmopolitan city.

Industrial legacy: Glasgow was one of the largest centres of engineering in Europe

The tourism chief also highlighted the rose-tinted nature of guide books, which by nature overlook the negative sides of many cities to concentrate on the attractions.

Taylor added: 'Glasgow has some difficulties but you wouldn’t expect to read about them in a tourist guide.

'For instance, you don’t read about 1950s housing around Krakow or the difficulties that Vancouver has in regards to crack and heroin.'

A spokesman for Thomas Cook defended the guide, which has been written by Edinburgh-based Zoe Ross saying: 'We pride ourselves on our history of producing independent travel guides which appeal to both first time and frequent visitors, our intention is not to be controversial or cause offence.

'Our city guides reflect how areas have changed, what gives them their personality and makes them different, as well as providing a wealth of useful visitor information.'