#welshgovernment — Public Fediverse posts

ALN FUNDING: Plaid and Labour strike £60m deal to revive the budget that fell in July

Schools and colleges across Wales will get an extra £60m this year for children with additional learning needs, after the Welsh Government and Welsh Labour reached the deal that sank the last budget.

The agreement clears the way for the Plaid Cymru government to lay its supplementary budget for 2026-27 before the Senedd today, with a vote on Tuesday 3 November.

Three months ago the same budget was voted down 49 to 44, with Labour’s nine MSs joining Reform UK and the Conservatives against it, after the two parties could not agree how much should go to ALN this year.

Labour had wanted £100m before April. First Minister Rhun ap Iorwerth had offered £40m a year for three years and called it his final proposal. Today’s figure is £60m for this financial year, as part of the wider package first set out in June.

That package, the government said at the time, carried £294m of extra spending, including £145m towards NHS waiting lists, £55m to expand funded childcare and £15m to extend free school meals to more secondary pupils.

What it means for Swansea

How much of the £60m reaches south west Wales is not yet set out. Swansea Council has already made its claim: councillors demanded the city’s share last month of the £322m Wales received on the back of special needs spending in England.

Council leader Rob Stewart put the city’s share of the government’s earlier £150m, three-year offer at £11m, and told councillors the government’s message to vulnerable learners so far had been “absolutely damning”.

The council says more than 6,600 primary pupils in Swansea have additional learning needs, around 1,600 of them needing more than their school can normally provide, and that in parts of the city more than 60 per cent of schools are already in the red.

Labour puts the Wales-wide figure at more than 40,000 children and young people with additional learning needs, rising every year, and says the £60m works out at around £1,500 per pupil.

Education minister Anna Brychan told the Senedd last month that there remained “opportunities” to send the ALN money to councils and schools, after Reform UK’s Gŵyr Abertawe MS Francesca O’Brien asked for it to go straight to councils.

“What can be achieved when parties work together”

Mr ap Iorwerth said the agreement “reflects what can be achieved when parties across the Senedd work together” and would “unlock an extra £60m towards additional learning needs in this financial year”.

He said it also allowed the government “to bring forward a supplementary budget that continues our investment in the NHS, childcare and free school meals”.

Welsh Labour leader Ken Skates, whose group forced the July defeat, said his party had “managed to secure a significant cash injection for schools this year” and that it was “50 per cent more than was on the table” when the government put £40m to Labour last week.

He called it “a welcome first step”, while saying Labour still believed the government “should be setting aside more for ALN in schools”, and promised to “call for more money later this year if another supplementary budget is laid before the Senedd”.

Labour’s statement also claims Plaid Cymru allocated nothing extra for ALN when it first brought the budget forward in the summer. The government’s final offer before the July vote was £40m a year for three years.

The July defeat was the biggest setback of the government’s first months, and the school leaders’ unions NAHT Cymru and ASCL Cymru declared a formal trade dispute over pay and ALN funding in the same week.

With Labour now backing the budget, the government has the votes it lacked in July. The debate is on 3 November.

Related stories from Swansea Bay News

BUDGET DEFEAT: Plaid government’s £294m spending plan voted down 49 to 44: the night the first budget fell, and who voted which way.

ALN FUNDING: ‘Absolutely damning’, Swansea leader rounds on Plaid over the £44m schools never saw: the council’s cross-party demand for its share.

SWANSEA: Francesca O’Brien takes the council’s £13.7m overspend to the Senedd: the minister’s “opportunities” answer on the ALN cash.

WELSH LABOUR: Ken Skates confirmed as leader the morning after his nine MSs sank Plaid’s budget: how Labour’s group lined up in July.

ADMIRAL: Some of the jobs being cut are set to move to India, but the insurer won’t say how many are Swansea’s

Admiral has confirmed that some of the roles it plans to cut in the UK would be done in India instead. But it will not say how many of the nearly 2,000 staff at its Swansea office are at risk.

A spokesperson for the insurer said: “These proposed changes would mean some roles being carried out in India.” The company says it is “unable to share exactly how many colleagues in our Swansea office may be affected”, and that “location was not a consideration” in deciding which roles go.

The spokesperson said it was not a case of around 500 UK roles being replaced by around 500 in India. The moves depend on the role rather than where it is based, and apply to some roles in some departments.

‘Remove some roles in the UK and scale our Delhi operations’

Admiral announced on 23 September that it plans to cut about 500 roles from its UK insurance business, around 5% of the workforce, as part of a drive to save £100m. A 45-day consultation with staff runs into early November.

A document sent to staff in one department says the company is “proposing to remove some roles in the UK and scale our Delhi operations”. Admiral confirms the document, and says it refers to one small team with very few people, where adding a handful more is what “scaling” means.

That document is not a picture of the overall plan, the spokesperson said. Admiral says it has had a “long-established presence” in India and will keep “continuing to develop capability” there “alongside our existing UK teams”, and that it “remains committed to its UK operations and the significant role they play in serving customers, developing talent and leading the business”.

A reply to the council leader, but still no site breakdown

Swansea Council leader Rob Stewart wrote to Alistair Hargreaves, chief executive of Admiral’s UK insurance business, last week seeking “urgent clarification” of what the cuts mean for the city. Admiral says a response has been sent. It did not say what the reply contains.

Asked whether Swansea staff would be told how the cuts fall between sites before the consultation ends, the company said everyone affected had already been briefed, at every site. “Decisions are based on the work required for the future, the capabilities needed to deliver it, and how the organisation can operate more effectively, and not a particular location,” the spokesperson said.

The spokesperson added that Admiral was committed to Swansea, and that the Swansea and Cardiff offices were both important to the company.

Admiral employs nearly 10,000 people in the UK, 6,700 of them in Cardiff and just under 2,000 at Admiral Group House in SA1. How the 500 fall between the two is the one number the company is not giving.

‘Completely optional’, the Senedd was told

Economy minister Adam Price told the Senedd last week that ministers did not know how the redundancies would be apportioned across sites, and that he was meeting Admiral’s UK chief executive.

Gwyn Williams, Plaid Cymru MS for Gŵyr Abertawe, told the chamber the cuts were “completely optional” for a company he said made a £958m profit last year, and would be “a disproportionate hit on the economy of Gŵyr Abertawe”.

Admiral says the cuts are not related to artificial intelligence, and are about having “the right structure, skills and ways of working to meet evolving customer needs”. Mr Hargreaves said last month: “We recognise this will be a difficult time for affected colleagues and our immediate priority is to support those impacted colleagues, including exploring redeployment opportunities wherever possible.”

It is too early to say whether the cuts will be voluntary or compulsory, the company says. Staff who lose their jobs are being offered enhanced redundancy pay, help finding work, up to £5,000 towards qualifications and up to £10,000 to start a business.

Cllr Stewart has asked the Welsh Government to open ReAct+, its retraining scheme for people made redundant, to anyone affected.

Related stories from Swansea Bay News

ADMIRAL: Nearly 2,000 Swansea staff still don’t know if their jobs are among the 500 to go
The council leader’s letter and the Senedd exchange, from last week.

Admiral coverage from Swansea Bay News
Every story on the insurer.

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Jobs, openings and closures across the region.

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The latest from across the city.

OSPREYS AND SCARLETS: Minister says she can’t save a region as Senedd fails to agree a single word on Welsh rugby’s future

The Senedd spent an hour debating the future of regional rugby on Wednesday, and failed to come to an agreement. The Ospreys and Scarlets are no safer this morning, and the Welsh Government has said in terms that it cannot save a region.

Culture and Sport Minister Heledd Fychan told the Chamber she shared every concern raised about the WRU‘s plan to cut the men’s game from four teams to three. But asked to ensure all four regions survive, she said: “I can’t give that assurance. That’s what you’re asking me to do.”

“We can’t, as a Government, direct the WRU to maintain a specific structure for the professional game,” she said. She had challenged the union to show its decisions were “transparent, evidence-based and sustainable” and that the impact on players, fans, staff and communities had been considered “before any decision is made, not afterwards”.

The union confirmed in July that Cardiff and the Dragons will be offered two of the three licences from 2028, leaving the Ospreys and Scarlets to fight for the third. Its licensing process starts in December.

‘With respect, the record shows that it has’

Fychan’s case rests on the WRU being independent of government. Much of the debate was about how much public money is already in the game.

Louise Emery, the Reform UK MS who moved the motion, listed it: £13.5m of Welsh Government survival funding in 2021, split £2.7m each between the union and the four regions; £475,000 in 2022; £1.8m for the national stadium in 2024; and nearly £435,000 from Sport Wales this year.

Swansea Council has approved £5.1m to rebuild St Helen’s with a 50-year lease for the Ospreys, and the city deal has added £771,000, she said. Carmarthenshire Council owns Parc y Scarlets and lent the club £2.4m, still being repaid.

“When the Minister told this Chamber last month that the Government does not fund professional sports teams, with respect, the record shows that it has,” she said.

She asked the Minister for three things: to get the WRU to publish its business case for three teams against four, independently checked, before licensing begins in December; a full public record of every grant, loan and stadium investment and the conditions attached; and a Government assessment of the impact on jobs, businesses, community programmes and player pathways.

What Swansea and Llanelli stand to lose

“What happens to St Helen’s, where 90 per cent of availability of the ground is meant for community use?” Emery asked. “Who pays the rent? Who fills the stands? What happens to Parc y Scarlets and the council loans still being repaid?” She listed the academies, the coaches and physios, Ospreys in the Community, and “the hotels, the pubs, the cafes and the taxis”.

Steven Rodaway, Reform’s MS for Gŵyr Abertawe, said: “We support the Ospreys. We support keeping all four professional rugby teams in Wales.” Saving the Ospreys “should never mean sacrificing the Scarlets”.

He said the Minister’s written answer to him had confirmed the Government had done no assessment of the economic or community impact. “Business rate support is welcome, but a pub needs customers.”

Carmelo Colasanto, Reform’s MS for Sir Gaerfyrddin, said losing the Scarlets “would be the final nail in the coffin for Llanelli town centre, a town that has already lost too much”. Match-day trade “does not move somewhere else in Llanelli, it simply disappears”.

He named Mervyn Davies, Scott Gibbs, Scott Quinnell, Ray Gravell and Phil Bennett. “These clubs are not franchises to be shuffled around a map. You cannot rebuild 150 years of sporting heritage. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever.”

Steve Bayliss, Reform’s MS for Afan Ogwr Rhondda, said Aberavon were playing their 150th season with Ospreys players in their squad: “That is what a player pathway looks like in practice.” His constituency and the Minister’s “knows what losing a region feels like”: the Celtic Warriors, built on Bridgend and Pontypridd, were wound up in 2004 after one season.

‘A play-off for the west’

Colasanto said a WRU letter he received on 15 September called Cardiff and the Dragons the preferred licence holders “given that they are the incumbents”. “Well, the Scarlets and the Ospreys are also incumbents, so I don’t know how they came to that conclusion.”

The capital licence was earmarked for a club the WRU itself owns, he said, whose £2.4m loss was left out of the group’s adjusted operating figures. The union had promised “a fair and transparent tendering process” for three licences; instead two were earmarked and one contested. “This is not a level playing field. It is a play-off for the west.”

Paul Davies, for the Welsh Conservatives, made the same point: the WRU “has a conflict of interest as the owner of one of the four regional teams”. The reason it had not published its business case was “in all probability” that “the business case isn’t strong enough”. He put his party on record for four teams.

John Davies, Plaid Cymru‘s MS for Gŵyr Abertawe, called the Reform motion “a political points-scoring exercise” because the union is independent, then turned on the union’s finances. Ireland’s rugby union earned around £86m against the WRU’s £106m, he said, yet Ireland’s men were third in the world and Wales’s could not make the top ten. “If there’s nothing to hide, why are they hiding?”

The WRU was “meant to be the stewards of the grass roots”, he said. “The Welsh Rugby Union have become nothing but a bloated corporate body managing the game’s slow decline.”

The Plaid MS Gwyn Williams, who shares the Gŵyr Abertawe seat, has already written to the union demanding board minutes showing whether Cardiff-linked members stood aside from the licence votes.

‘Not within our remit’

Fychan said many of the questions were for the WRU, not her, and “it is important that the WRU listens to this debate today and responds to those concerns”. Lis McLean, Plaid’s MS for Pontypridd Cynon Merthyr, intervened on Reform: “What you’re asking for is not what’s within our remit.” The union was “coming before the committee again”, she said, and the motion was an attempt “to get some sort of feeling of ‘We love rugby'”.

Tata, and a press release

Closing for Reform, Llŷr Powell said the regions were worth an estimated £50m to £55m a year to the Welsh economy and the Government had intervened for employers before. “What role you have to play is the same as when Tata was going under. We stepped in to protect jobs.”

He said the Deputy First Minister had told the last Labour Government in February “you simply can’t wash your hands of this”, and the First Minister had recently argued that a Senedd motion on fair funding could “send a clear signal”. “We could have sent to the WRU today a clear message that this is unacceptable.”

Plaid had issued a press release during the election campaign calling for the Scarlets’ survival, he said. “And today, they’re saying that their Government can’t get involved. That is unacceptable.” Fychan replied: “You’re misrepresenting them.”

He called the WRU “the worst-run union right now” and said talent was already leaving for English leagues because of the uncertainty. “We’ll be back here when the danger comes if you don’t support them now, because we know the WRU will push this through.”

Then the votes

At voting time, an hour later, the Reform motion fell 44 to 43, with one abstention. The Government’s amendment, which replaced the commitment to four regions with a call for a “full assessment” of the social, community and economic consequences, tied 44-44.

Deputy Presiding Officer Kerry Ferguson used her casting vote against it, as the Senedd‘s rules require on a tie. “I’ve never done this before,” she said. The Senedd therefore agreed nothing.

The WRU’s director of rugby, Dave Reddin, said last month the cut to three teams was “the way forward” and the union was “really committed to it”. Swansea Council’s High Court challenge to the union is ongoing.

Related stories from Swansea Bay News

WRU: Reddin insists cut to three teams is happening, blaming ‘brutal economics’
The union’s director of rugby on why the Ospreys and Scarlets must fight for one licence.

WRU: Swansea Senedd member demands proof Cardiff-linked board members sat out licence votes
Gwyn Williams’s letter to the union’s interim chair.

WRU: Cardiff and Dragons safe as Ospreys and Scarlets left fighting for one west Wales licence
The July decision at the centre of the row.

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Every story on the union and the west Wales licence fight.

LLANELLI: How many scabies cases are there at Prince Philip? MS demands ministers say, ten days into ward closures

A Senedd member has called on the Welsh Government to make an urgent statement on the scabies outbreak at Prince Philip Hospital, ten days after Hywel Dda closed wards and restricted visiting without saying how many patients were affected.

Claire Archibald, Reform UK MS for Ceredigion Penfro and the party’s shadow minister for social care, said ministers needed to say how many cases there were, when they first knew and what investigations had found about where the outbreak began.

Visiting at the Llanelli hospital has been restricted since Sunday 27 September, when the health board said “a number of wards” were closed by infection. It has published nothing further on the outbreak since.

It is the second time since July that scabies has closed wards at a Hywel Dda hospital, after Steffan Ward at Glangwili in Carmarthen was shut by crusted scabies, a severe form of the condition.

Archibald said: “Repeated scabies outbreaks have closed wards in West Wales, and we still need clear answers about how many people are affected.”

“Ministers can’t leave this to the health board and hope it goes away. They need to tell us how many cases there are, when they first knew, and what investigations have established about where this outbreak came from and how it has spread.”

What the health board has said

When the restrictions came in, Sharon Daniel, Hywel Dda‘s executive director of nursing, said the decision had been taken to limit the spread “on our site and in our community”, with patients, staff and their contacts being treated and wards deep cleaned.

The board said cases were being managed in hospitals and community settings across its area and the risk to the wider public was low. It did not put a number on them, and has not since.

The Minor Injury Unit stayed open, and patients whose planned appointments were affected were to be contacted.

‘Patients, staff and our NHS deserve protection’

Archibald, who worked in healthcare before her election, said: “We need robust health checks and strict infection control wherever there is a risk of scabies spreading, backed by swift treatment for those affected.”

“Ministers must explain why outbreaks keep closing wards and set out a clear plan to prevent this happening again. Patients, staff and our NHS deserve protection. The public deserves answers and action.”

Health is devolved, and Hywel Dda answers to Mabon ap Gwynfor, the Cabinet Minister for Health and Care.

Scabies is caused by mites burrowing into the skin and spreads mainly through prolonged skin-to-skin contact. The health board says it has nothing to do with hygiene and anyone can catch it; the main sign is intense itching, worse at night, with a rash often between the fingers and on the wrists.

Treatment is available from pharmacies and GPs, applied twice seven days apart, and everyone in a household should be treated at the same time, the board advises.

The outbreak comes as the hospital waits on the board’s decision on its stroke beds, due on 26 November.

Related stories from Swansea Bay News

LLANELLI: Visiting restricted at Prince Philip Hospital as scabies outbreak shuts wards
The 27 September restrictions and the health board’s full statement.

GLANGWILI: Hospital ward closed by outbreak of crusted scabies, as contacts are offered treatment
The July outbreak in Carmarthen.

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Every story on the outbreaks.

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The latest from the Llanelli hospital.

PONTARDAWE: Mary Hopkin to receive Welsh Music Inspiration Award, 58 years after ‘Those Were The Days’

Mary Hopkin, who went from recording Welsh-language songs for a local label to the top of the UK charts with Those Were The Days, is to receive one of Welsh music’s highest honours tonight.

The Pontardawe-raised singer has been named the winner of the Welsh Music Inspiration Award, 58 years after the single that made her a star.

Hopkin said: “I’m very grateful for this honour. I don’t feel worthy at all of achieving it, but thank you, everyone. It’s wonderful.”

Her daughter Jessica Lee Morgan, with whom she recorded the 2023 duets album Two Hearts, will accept the award on her behalf.

The Welsh Music Prize says the award recognises people whose impact goes beyond record sales and chart success: those who have shaped Welsh culture, championed creativity and left a lasting mark on the generations that followed.

It will be presented at tonight’s ceremony at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff, hosted by Siân Eleri and broadcast live on BBC Radio Wales and BBC Radio Cymru, with performances from the shortlisted artists Adjua, Gwenifer Raymond, Local and Dafydd Owain.

From Opportunity Knocks to Apple Records

Hopkin’s break came on ITV’s Opportunity Knocks in 1968, where the model Twiggy spotted her and recommended her to Paul McCartney. She became one of the first artists signed to Apple Records, the label founded by The Beatles.

McCartney produced her debut single. Those Were The Days topped the UK charts, reached number two in the United States and has sold more than eight million copies worldwide, according to the Welsh Music Prize.

The only record standing between it and the top of the American chart was The Beatles’ own Hey Jude. Jimi Hendrix, Brian Wilson and Eric Clapton were among the guests when her McCartney-produced debut album Postcard was launched in 1969.

She represented the United Kingdom at the 1970 Eurovision Song Contest with Knock Knock, Who’s There?, finishing second, sang backing vocals on David Bowie’s Low and provided vocals for Vangelis’s soundtrack to Blade Runner in 1982. Organisers also cite a Grammy nomination.

‘Her voice gives a gravitas to every thing she sings’

Ralph McTell, who toured with Hopkin in 1972, said her gift went beyond technique. “It’s not just her tonality and musical accuracy, it’s also her ability to understand and get to the emotional heart of the song,” he said.

He added: “Her voice gives a gravitas to every thing she sings and she gives everything a personal commitment, as if she wrote the song herself. She richly deserves this honour.”

Yusuf/Cat Stevens, whose song The Wind Hopkin covered, said: “Mary has one of those rare voices that carries a natural purity and innocence. Her voice has affected people’s lives. It is good to see her remarkable contribution to music recognised and celebrated.”

A family affair

Hopkin has kept writing and recording through the decades, often with her son Morgan Visconti and her daughter.

Jessica Lee Morgan said: “Our mother has raised us with the highest respect for music, a quality which she took for granted in her Welsh upbringing. She even inspired our American father, Tony Visconti, to learn Welsh.”

She added: “It’s never been about the fame, image or business, only the music. I’m delighted to be invited to represent her and accept this award on her behalf.”

Previous winners include bassist Pino Palladino (2025), hip hop pioneers Eric Martin and DJ Jaffa (2024), folk protest singer Dafydd Iwan (2023), The Alarm’s Mike Peters (2022), David R. Edwards and Pat Morgan of Datblygu (2021), folk music historians Meredydd Evans and Phylis Kinney (2019) and Welsh-language singer-songwriter Meic Stevens (2018).

The Welsh Music Prize is supported by the Welsh Government through Creative Wales and by Cardiff Council, and tonight’s ceremony opens Llais Festival as part of Cardiff Music City Festival.

Related stories from Swansea Bay News

‘Those Were The Days’ Welsh singer Mary Hopkin to release album of duets with daughter
Two Hearts, the 2023 album Hopkin wrote and recorded with Jessica Lee Morgan.

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All our music coverage, from gigs to the Welsh charts.

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The latest news from Pontardawe and the Swansea Valley.

TAITHCYMRU: Carmarthen to Bangor for £10 as tickets go on sale for the new north-south coach

Tickets for the TaithCymru coach between Carmarthen and Bangor went on sale on Tuesday, with a promotional adult single for the full five-hour run priced at £10.

Transport for Wales is offering the cut fares until January 2027 to get people to try the service, which launches on Sunday 25 October with nine return trips a day run by Edwards Coaches and Llew Jones.

The other launch fares are £7 from Bangor to Aberystwyth, £4 from Holyhead to Bangor and £12.50 from Holyhead to Carmarthen, the leg covered by the one late-night coach a day that carries on to Holyhead station and port.

TfW has not published a promotional fare for Carmarthen to Aberystwyth or Aberaeron, the shorter hops most passengers from this end are likely to make. Those prices appear only when a journey is searched on its booking site.

Five hours end to end, and no bus passes

From Carmarthen railway station the coach calls at Aberaeron, Aberystwyth bus station, Aberystwyth University, Machynlleth, Dolgellau, Porthmadog and Caernarfon before Bangor station.

TfW puts the full journey at between four hours 45 minutes and five hours, which it says is up to an hour quicker than the current public transport options, with no change of vehicle.

Timetables have been built to connect with trains and local buses, and are on TfW’s website.

Because TaithCymru is a pre-booked long-distance coach with its own fares, concessionary bus passes are not accepted on it, TfW says. The TrawsCymru T1 bus, which the coach broadly follows between Carmarthen and Aberystwyth, does take them.

Book ahead, not on the door

Seats are booked at tfw.wales/taithcymru or through the support line on 03333 211 202. Bookings open on a rolling 14-day window and can be made up to 15 minutes before departure if seats are left.

Tickets cannot be bought from the driver.

The coaches are wheelchair accessible, with Wi-Fi, USB charging, air conditioning, toilets and luggage space, but TfW says the onboard toilets are not wheelchair accessible and not every stop is, Aberaeron among them.

Passengers who need assistance are asked to contact the support team at least 36 hours before travelling. Assistance dogs travel free.

Lee Robinson, TfW’s executive director for regional transport and integration, said: “TaithCymru gives customers a new, direct way to travel across Wales, with quicker journey times, comfortable coaches and fares designed to encourage people to give the service a try.”

He added: “Whether you’re travelling to university, for work, to see family and friends or for a day out, you can now book ahead and enjoy a simpler journey with fewer changes.”

The promotional fares run until early January, when TfW says a standard fare structure takes over. The Welsh Government’s £2m covers the service’s first year, with a decision on funding beyond that resting on demand.

Related stories from Swansea Bay News

TAITHCYMRU: Nine coaches a day from Carmarthen to Bangor, one going on to Holyhead, and the operators want drivers
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TAITHCYMRU: The new coach linking Carmarthen and Bangor launches on 25 October
The launch date and the £2m first year.

CARMARTHEN: TfW wants the railway station to work better as a train-and-coach interchange
The survey on the station the coach starts from.

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CARMARTHENSHIRE: Blue bags end for a third of homes on Monday 2 November

A third of homes in Carmarthenshire will stop putting their recycling out in blue bags from Monday 2 November, when the county’s switch to colour-coded sacks begins.

Carmarthenshire Council says most homes in the first phase, mainly in the west of the county, start on that date. A small number will start later in November, because the service is being brought in in stages.

Every home will get a letter this month with its start date and collection arrangements, and the council says residents should follow the dates in it. In July, the council said that letter would arrive in September.

Your bin day could change even if you keep blue bags

The change reaches beyond the homes switching. Collection days, or the week black bags go out, may change for homes across the county, including the two thirds staying on blue bags for now.

Homes staying on the old service will get their own letter and a new calendar in October. Their usual yearly supply of blue bags and caddy liners will arrive between November and January.

For a small number of homes, the new rounds leave a gap of more than three weeks between the last black bag collection on the old schedule and the first on the new one. The council says it will run a one-off extra collection for those homes, and write to them separately with the date.

Five sacks, and how to check yours has arrived

Homes switching will sort their recycling into red, orange and blue sacks, with red bags for plastic film and a white sack for batteries. We set out what goes in each sack, and what doesn’t when the switch was announced in July.

The sacks are being delivered during September and October, along with a year’s supply of food caddy liners. Residents can check online whether deliveries in their area are finished, and report a missed delivery if theirs hasn’t come.

Food waste, recycling and glass will all be collected weekly. Garden waste and hygiene and nappy collections are unchanged, and black bags stay at three every three weeks.

Carmarthenshire is the 19th council in Wales to switch

The council says the change is part of the Welsh Government‘s Collections Blueprint, which is meant to raise both the amount and the quality of recycling collected.

Carmarthenshire will be the 19th council in Wales to move to separated collections, it says, a system first brought in elsewhere in Wales in the early 2000s. It says councils that miss Welsh Government recycling targets could face significant fines, with potential consequences for council taxpayers.

A new rulebook written for the switch sets out a ladder for households that keep getting it wrong, running from a letter to a warden’s visit to fines.

Your October letter has your start date

Cllr Edward Thomas, the council’s cabinet member for transport, waste and infrastructure services, said: “It is important that residents look out for their letter in October, as this will confirm their start date and any changes to their collection day or week.”

He said the switch would help the county hit its targets: “By separating our recycling, we can improve the quality of the materials we collect, recycle more of our waste and help Carmarthenshire achieve its recycling targets.”

Residents can check whether their home is changing with the council’s postcode checker.

They can also sign up for free email or text reminders of their collection days.

Related stories from Swansea Bay News

CARMARTHENSHIRE: Blue bags scrapped for a third of homes, and everyone’s collection day could change
What goes in each sack, and what doesn’t.

STICKER SHOCK: Wrong bag, wrong day, and the new Carmarthenshire bin rules that can end in court
The rulebook behind the switch, from stickers to fines.

SWANSEA: No UK city recycles more, new green league table shows
How the county’s neighbour scored in a new study of 94 cities.

More on recycling
Bins, sacks and tips across south west Wales.

ADMIRAL: Nearly 2,000 Swansea staff still don’t know if their jobs are among the 500 to go

Nearly 2,000 people who work for Admiral in Swansea still do not know whether their jobs are among the 500 the insurer plans to cut.

Swansea Council leader Rob Stewart has written to Alistair Hargreaves, chief executive of Admiral’s UK insurance business, seeking “urgent clarification” of what the cuts mean for the city.

The Welsh Government does not know yet either.

Adam Price, the economy minister, told the Senedd on Wednesday: “We don’t know currently how these redundancies will be apportioned across the individual sites.”

Admiral job cuts: 500 roles, £100m savings, no sites named

Admiral announced on 23 September that it plans to cut about 500 roles from its UK insurance business, around 5% of the workforce, as part of a drive to save £100m.

It employs nearly 10,000 people in the UK, most of them in Cardiff, and just under 2,000 at Admiral Group House in SA1.

Admiral says it is too early to say whether the cuts will be voluntary or compulsory. A 45-day consultation with staff is under way.

Council leader writes to Admiral UK boss Alistair Hargreaves

Cllr Stewart told Thursday’s full council meeting it was “still unclear at the present time” what the impact would be for staff in the Swansea office.

He said his letter also asks about Swansea people who work at Admiral’s Cardiff headquarters.

He has also asked the Welsh Government, with colleagues, to make ReAct+, its scheme that pays for retraining and helps people back into work after redundancy, available to anyone affected.

“I’m sure we send the staff of Admiral our very best in terms of what may be ahead of them,” he said.

‘These lay-offs are completely optional’, Gŵyr Abertawe MS Gwyn Williams tells the Senedd

Gwyn Williams, Plaid Cymru MS for Gŵyr Abertawe, told the chamber the announcement had been “devastating for our own communities”.

“We’ve had many e-mails about this,” he said. “In fact, one came just in the time that we’ve been sitting here in Plenary.”

He said Admiral, Wales’ only FTSE 100 company, recorded a £958m profit last year. “It is my view, and the view of my fellow MSs, that these lay-offs are completely optional,” he said.

The economic situation in his constituency was “fragile, to say the most favourable thing”, he said, and the cuts would be “a disproportionate hit on the economy of Gŵyr Abertawe”.

It is the second time since July he has taken big Swansea job losses to the Senedd, after Swansea Bay health board’s plan to cut around 800 posts.

Caerdydd Penarth MS Kiera Marshall, also Plaid Cymru, said colleagues in Gŵyr Abertawe and Brycheiniog Tawe Nedd had shared their concerns about Swansea. “Workers need certainty about their futures and how they’re going to support their families and pay ever-increasing bills and rent,” she said.

Economy minister to meet Admiral chief executive

Mr Price told MSs he was meeting Admiral UK Insurance’s chief executive on Thursday, and had reached out to unions and workforce representatives.

He promised to share what he learned with members who have large numbers of constituents working for the company, once the picture is clearer.

Labour MS Huw Thomas, who asked the question, said he and Cardiff’s four MPs had met Admiral and Legal & General, which is also cutting jobs, “to press both companies to minimise compulsory redundancies and maximise redeployment opportunities”.

Admiral says job cuts are not about AI

Reform UK MS Jason O’Connell asked what part artificial intelligence had played. Mr Price said Admiral had said the reductions “are not AI related”.

Admiral says the changes are about having “the right structure, skills and ways of working to meet evolving customer needs”, and making the business “faster and more efficient”.

“We recognise this will be a difficult time for affected colleagues and our immediate priority is to support those impacted colleagues, including exploring redeployment opportunities wherever possible,” Mr Hargreaves said.

Admiral says staff who lose their jobs will be offered enhanced redundancy pay, help to find work, up to £5,000 towards qualifications and up to £10,000 to start their own business.

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By Bethan McKernan, Wales correspondent

Plaid Cymru’s Rhun ap Iorwerth says he has asked PM to ‘put Wales on equal footing with Scotland as bare minimum’

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PORTHCAWL: The Buccaneer is saved, and getting its 1930s ocean liner look back

Porthcawl‘s Buccaneer isn’t coming down after all.

The seafront bar on the corner of Mackworth Road and Sandy Bay was due to be flattened for new development, after its previous owner applied to demolish it. Instead it is going to be restored.

Bridgend County Borough Council says the plan is to strip off the mismatched modern additions and bring back the building’s original 1930s “ocean liner” design, with its views over the beach and the sea.

What goes inside is still being worked out. The council’s early ideas include a restaurant or café, and space for new shops and kiosks.

The Beachcomber and the old Wimpy come down first

Demolition held back over the summer is now going ahead, focused on the former Coney Beach funfair and the Beachcomber site.

The Beachcomber closed for good on 11 January. Known in earlier years as the Cabin and the Showboat, it was a busy venue for live music and discos, and a regular stage for tribute acts during the town’s Elvis Festival.

The council confirmed in July that the building would come down once the summer season ended. The old Wimpy building goes too, which the council says will give the restored Buccaneer clear views of the beach and sea.

The council says it will keep the seafront open while the work goes on, so people can still walk, cycle, use wheelchairs and push buggies along it.

It also plans stopgap attractions while the regeneration is under way, from padel courts and crazy golf to beach yoga and surf schools, with details promised “very soon”.

From the Continental Café to the Pagoda Rooms

The building opened in the 1930s as the Continental Café, the council says. After the Second World War it became Sidoli’s Ice Cream Parlour, until the mid-1950s.

It then became the Rising Sun, a live music venue with an upstairs nightclub, the Pagoda Rooms, and stayed at the centre of the town’s youth and music scene until the late 1970s.

It was relaunched as The Buccaneer, a bar the council says was once described as “the beating heart of the community”.

In almost 100 years on the corner it has been a café, an ice cream parlour, a nightclub and a bar.

How a demolition plan became a restoration

The Buccaneer closed in 2024 after its owner sought permission to knock it down. The Welsh Government then bought it so the site could become part of the council’s waterfront regeneration plans.

Cllr Colin Davies, the council’s cabinet member for regeneration and housing, said: “The Buccaneer has had a long and colourful association with Porthcawl, and we want that to continue with the venue once more becoming an iconic seafront landmark and a stand-out part of our plans to regenerate the waterfront area.”

He said the way the council and Welsh Government planned to restore it “offers a taste of how we are approaching the overall waterfront regeneration”, adding: “Retaining and restoring this building to its former glory can only be a positive move for Porthcawl.”

The rescue comes under the reshaped seafront masterplan unveiled last November, redrawn after residents pushed back on earlier designs.

That plan also put Sandy Bay beach back into public ownership, with surf lessons and outdoor fitness sessions promised.

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CYCLE PATH UPGRADE: Popular Dunvant to Gowerton route to get £500k revamp

The old railway path between Dunvant and Gowerton is about to get wider.

Swansea Council has £500,000 from the Welsh Government to widen the 1.75km stretch, the same treatment the lower section from Blackpill to Dunvant has already had. Sections will close while the work is done, and the council says dates and details will come via signs on the route.

For a lot of people in both villages the path is the school run, the commute or the dog walk, so the plan-ahead advice will matter once the work starts.

The path is National Cycle Network Route 4, the traffic-free line from the seafront at Blackpill up through Killay and Dunvant to Gowerton.

What you’ll get at the end of it

A wider path. The council says the point is room: for people on foot, on bikes and on mobility scooters to pass each other without stopping, and less bunching up at the pinch points.

The council says the Blackpill to Dunvant widening has gone down well. In January it put the spend on the main Clyne Valley path at more than £1m.

“By widening the path we can make it more comfortable, accessible and attractive for all users, giving people more space and helping to support safer journeys on foot, by bike and by other active travel means,” said Cllr Andrew Stevens, the cabinet member for environment and infrastructure.

“We will keep disruption to a minimum”

On the closures, Cllr Stevens said: “We appreciate that temporary closures will cause some disruption while the work is taking place, but these are needed to allow the improvements to be delivered safely. We will keep disruption to a minimum and make sure clear information is available for route users.”

The stretch is well used by people travelling between the two villages, he said, “whether they are commuting, getting to school, visiting local facilities or enjoying the route for leisure”.

The money comes from the Welsh Government’s Regional Transport Fund, which the council says favours walking, wheeling, cycling and public transport schemes.

Where it stops

The scheme ends at Gowerton. It does not touch the long-argued-over gap from Gowerton on to Penclawdd, where a shared path has had planning permission since 2006 and cyclists are still on the B4295.

That link, and a bridleway route from Waunarlwydd onto NCN4 avoiding Gorwydd Road, were both on the redrawn walking and cycling map the council put out to consultation this summer. Being on the map is what makes a route eligible for Welsh Government money; it is not a promise it gets built.

For the Dunvant to Gowerton stretch, the money is now in hand. Dates for the work and the closures are the next thing to look out for.

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ALCOHOL: Cheapest booze goes up 30% in Wales from today, and the deaths it was meant to stop are at a record

The floor price of alcohol in Wales goes up by nearly a third from Thursday, and the strongest cheap drinks on the shelf will feel it most.

From 1 October nothing can be sold for less than 65p a unit, up from the 50p that has applied since March 2020. A three-litre bottle of white cider, around 22 units, cannot now be sold for less than about £14.30. A bottle of wine starts at £5.85, a litre of vodka at £24.38, a four-pack of strong lager at £5.20.

It is not a tax. The extra money stays with the shop and the producer, not the Welsh Government.

“Someone’s parent, partner or child”

Ministers say the change could prevent more than 900 alcohol-related deaths and help nearly 5,000 people cut down on harmful drinking over the next 20 years.

“Every one of the hundreds of lives this change could save is someone’s parent, partner or child,” said Nerys Evans, the deputy minister for public and preventative health. “That’s why this matters.”

The 50p rate, she said, “has been made less effective by inflation”, worth 39p in 2020 money, “so raising it to 65p is not about punishing people who drink responsibly, it’s about closing that gap”.

Andrew Misell of Alcohol Change UK said the new price “will keep big bottles of super-strength cider off the shelves” and make bulk discounts harder, “and all this without pushing up the price of a pint in pubs”.

Deaths at a record while the 50p price was in force

Alcohol-specific deaths in Wales reached a record 562 in 2023, or 17.7 per 100,000 people. That is higher than before minimum pricing came in.

When the rise was put out to consultation last summer, the Welsh Conservatives called the policy a failure, pointing to a 50% rise in alcohol-related deaths between 2019 and 2023, and Darren Millar said it should be scrapped in favour of “the inadequate investment in addiction services”.

The government’s answer is that the pandemic and the cost of living crisis got in the way, and that the policy has still been “broadly positive”.

Skipped meals and a switch to spirits

Five years at 50p cleared the cheap high-strength drinks from the shelves and consumption appears to have fallen. Some dependent drinkers skipped meals or bills to keep drinking, and others switched from cider to spirits.

Iola Ynyr, a writer from Gwynedd who has spoken about her own alcoholism, told the BBC last year that price does not change a dependent drinker. “If someone’s addicted, they’ll find a way to get alcohol. It’s the families who suffer.”

The academics who reviewed the policy wanted it kept, the price raised, and treatment funded properly. The Welsh Government says it spends more than £68m a year on people affected by alcohol and drugs, £41m of it on local services.

Wales now charges the same as Scotland, which went to 65p in 2024. England has no minimum price, so the drive over the bridge for a boot full of cider is the one effect everyone expected and, so far, nobody has found.

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CARMARTHEN: Wilko demolition pushed back to next year as council says a tenant “of significant benefit to the town” is in talks

The former Wilko in Carmarthen is not coming down next month after all.

Carmarthenshire County Council says demolition of the Friars Park store, which its own notice pencilled in for 26 October, is now expected to start early next year because “the wider programme has since changed”.

And for the first time it has said who it is talking to about the site afterwards, or nearly. The council says it is in commercial talks with interested parties, “including negotiations with a prospective tenant which would be of significant benefit to the town”. No deal has been signed, and it will say more “when the Council is in a position to do so”.

Welsh Government picks up the whole bill

The demolition will be paid for in full by the Welsh Government through its Transforming Towns programme, the council says, at no cost to the county.

The council’s case for knocking the building down is unchanged. Surveys when it bought the lease found the store needed major work before anyone could move in, with the roof alone put at around £1m. The council decided that was not value for money and that the building had “reached the end of its usable life”.

Clearing the site would also let it rebuild the car park behind, which it says “no longer meets modern standards”.

Cabinet member for regeneration Cllr Hazel Evans said: “With Welsh Government fully funding the demolition, and essential roof works alone estimated at around £1 million, demolition is the most cost-effective way to unlock the site’s potential and prepare it for a productive long-term use.”

She said the council welcomed public interest in the site and shared “the community’s view that its future development must support the wider regeneration of the town”.

Buzz Parks offered a different building

The statement is the council’s first public answer to the “Jobs not rubble” campaign that gathered outside the store on Friday, where trampoline park firm Buzz Parks said it had been trying to take the building on for more than a year and heard very little back.

The council’s answer is not the building. It says that following an approach on Buzz Parks’ behalf, it has offered to discuss “alternative potential opportunities within the town” with the firm’s owners, and would help broker talks with private landlords where it does not own the premises.

Buzz Parks had proposed a trampoline park, climbing, soft play, a zip wire and a sports bar in the old store, and said it could bring 2,000 to 2,500 families a week into the town centre.

Welsh Government minister Siân Gwenllian, whose department holds the Transforming Towns money, called it “a welcome step forward for Carmarthen town centre”. “Clearing this site is about more than demolition,” she said. “It’s about creating the conditions for productive, long-term use that supports the town’s continued regeneration.”

From Tesco to Wilko to an empty shell

The store closed with the rest of the Wilko chain in October 2023, and the council bought the lease the following March, already owning the freehold. Cabinet approved the demolition in July without debate, and site notices went up in August with the 26 October date the council has now dropped.

What replaces it is still not public. The council says it will give an update “as and when developments with interested parties progress”.

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TAITHCYMRU: Nine coaches a day from Carmarthen to Bangor, one going on to Holyhead, and the operators want drivers

The new TaithCymru coach will run nine times a day in each direction between Carmarthen railway station and Bangor when it launches on Sunday 25 October, Transport for Wales has confirmed.

One late-night journey each day will carry on beyond Bangor to Holyhead railway station and port. Transport for Wales says that improves connections with rail and ferry services for Anglesey and Ireland.

Edwards Coaches has been appointed to run the service as lead operator, working with Llew Jones. Both firms are now recruiting drivers ahead of the launch.

Every stop from Carmarthen to Bangor, and a five-hour run end to end

From Carmarthen, the coach calls at Aberaeron, Aberystwyth bus station, Aberystwyth University, Machynlleth, Dolgellau, Porthmadog and Caernarfon before reaching Bangor railway station.

The full journey is expected to take about five hours. TfW says that is up to an hour faster than existing public transport, with no change of vehicle.

Eight new coaches have been bought for the route. They are wheelchair accessible with dedicated luggage space, and the timetable is designed to connect with rail, local buses and TrawsCymru.

Lee Robinson, TfW’s executive director for regional transport and integration, said the appointment was “an important step towards giving customers a new way to travel across Wales”.

“The daily late-night extension to Holyhead will also strengthen links with Anglesey, Ireland and the wider public transport network,” he said.

Driving jobs with Edwards Coaches and Llew Jones

Jessica Thomas, from Edwards Coaches, said the firm was “proud to have been chosen” as lead operator. “We’re now recruiting drivers to join our team and help us provide the friendly, dependable service our customers expect.”

Steve Jones, from Llew Jones, said the partnership would “create better links for the communities we serve”. “We’re also looking for drivers to join us and play a key role in introducing this important new connection.”

Tickets from 6 October, fares still to come

Tickets go on sale online on Tuesday 6 October. TfW says more on fares and booking will appear on its website “shortly”, so two weeks before sales open, the price of a seat is still not public.

The coach will pull in at a station TfW is already asking passengers about. Its survey on making Carmarthen station work better as a train and coach interchange is open until 12 October.

The £2m committed to TaithCymru covers its first year, and the Welsh Government has said it will assess demand before deciding whether to fund it beyond that.

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YSGOL HEOL GOFFA: Health minister said 2027. Education minister says no timescale. Still no nurse

Children at Ysgol Heol Goffa will be looked after this term, as last term, by teachers and classroom assistants doing medical jobs a nurse would normally do. The two ministers responsible cannot agree on when that changes.

Lynne Neagle, Labour’s education spokesperson, told the Senedd on Wednesday that the health minister had written to a campaigner saying guidance on supporting pupils with healthcare needs “would be published some time in 2027”.

The education minister’s written answer to her, she said, was that “this work is at an early stage” and “we are not yet in a position to confirm a timescale for the publication of revised guidance”.

“So, there is a difference there between what two ministers have said,” Ms Neagle said.

Catheters and feeding lines, done by staff “not trained for” them

Ms Neagle said support staff were “on too many occasions” asked to help with “complex medical issues in schools, including things like attending to catheters and feeding lines”, tasks they were “either not trained for or certainly not remunerated for”.

She reminded the chamber that Estyn had issued a safeguarding letter to the school after last year’s inspection “around issues around healthcare support in school”.

The work, she said, “has to be driven at Government level by the Cabinet Ministers responsible, in both health and education”, and she asked Anna Brychan for an assurance she would work with the health minister’s team so the interface between the two was “absolutely seamless”.

Ms Brychan’s reply in full: “Yes, that is an assurance I can absolutely give her. Thank you.”

The 2027 letter that was “a kick in the teeth”

Some of the children at the school have breathing tubes fitted at their throats, some need help with catheters and some have seizures, and there is no nurse permanently based there. Parents and the headteacher have been asking for one for five years.

In August, health minister Mabon ap Gwynfor’s letter to Llanelli town councillor Shaun Greaney said staff “have received appropriate training and have been assessed as competent”, and that where a nurse should come from “remain[s] a matter for the relevant local authority and health board”.

Lana Dakin, whose eight-year-old son Jac attends the school, said at the time that “getting a letter that just talks about training and guidance in 2027 is a kick in the teeth”.

Hywel Dda University Health Board says a community children’s nursing service visits the school and it trains staff there to carry out the procedures the children need. What it does not provide is a nurse based at the school full time.

The Children’s Commissioner for Wales asked to meet the health board about the same issue in February.

Earlier in the session Ms Brychan said support staff “do an enormously positive and important job” and that health “and arguably also preventative health” would be key partners in deciding how to support them, but “I can’t give her a timeline at this point”.

The school was built for fewer than 100 pupils and now teaches close to 150 children with complex needs. A new £35m Ysgol Heol Goffa is due to open in September 2029.

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RAIL CENTRE: £70m spent, not a pound of private money in, and two ministers in two days won’t say if it’s going ahead

The rail testing centre that was supposed to bring up to 1,000 jobs to the top of the Dulais Valley has had £70m of public money and none from anyone else, the Senedd has been told.

Asked twice in two days whether it will be built, the Welsh Government said a decision is coming “soon” and that the Onllwyn site is being looked at “in the round”.

Andrew RT Davies told the First Minister on Tuesday the project had “burned through £70 million of public money to date” and “not £1 of private money has gone into it”. He put the cost of building it at £350m to £400m.

Rhun ap Iorwerth said work had been commissioned on what had happened to the money and “we need to come to a decision soon”.

“Gift” or purchase?

On Wednesday Janet Finch-Saunders asked Adam Price whether Celtic Energy gave the land or sold it, and who pays if the money to restore the old opencast runs out.

The economy minister said he did not have the answers “at my fingertips” and would take the questions away.

When Neath Port Talbot and Powys councillors approved the scheme in August 2021, the Welsh Government said the land deal would “see Celtic Energy gift all the land necessary for the project”. In 2022 it announced the “formal acquisition” of the site.

Opening date: summer 2025

The government put in £50m, as a loan through Powys Council, and the UK Government £30m, and the government’s published timetable had the centre fully operational by summer 2025. Vaughan Gething, then economy minister, said in 2021 he looked forward to it “progressing at pace over the coming months”.

GCRE Ltd, which the government owns outright, went to the market in January 2023 for an investor to take at least 51% of the company. It has not found one.

Last December the government said it was “prepared to explore how the GCRE project can be further de-risked by virtue of additional public funding or the provision of a guarantee”, and paid for six months of design work.

Data centres on the table

The company is now looking for a partner “that can develop complementary renewable energy and data centre assets at the GCRE site”, according to a profile of its chief executive published by the government’s Trade and Invest Wales in March.

Mr Price told the Senedd the government had “received that specialist advice” and was “discussing with other potential investors what the potential is”. “We’re looking both at the Global Centre of Rail Excellence option, but looking at it in the round as well,” he said.

Ms Finch-Saunders said the government had “inherited a large hole in the ground, a project nobody is prepared to invest in, and, potentially, a very large bill for putting the site back as it was”.

Transport campaigner Dr John McTeague has asked the Auditor General to investigate, in an appeal sent to every Senedd member, saying the money spent is “far in excess” of the Circuit of Wales, which cost £14.9m. Audit Wales told him it had “no immediate plans” to look at the project before the government decides.

Mr ap Iorwerth said: “I’m not going to criticise the concept that came from the current leader of the Labour Party, but we have to understand what has happened as those tens of millions of pounds have been spent on the site, and what maybe hasn’t happened.”

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CARMARTHEN: TfW wants the railway station to work better as a train-and-coach interchange

Transport for Wales wants Carmarthen railway station to work better as the place where its TrawsCymru coaches and its trains meet, and is asking passengers what that should look like.

Its survey, open until 12 October, covers two things: the facilities at the station for people catching trains, and how the bus and rail services there “can be better worked together”, in the words of the consultation page. TfW staff will be at the station from 8am to 6pm on Thursday to take views in person.

The timing is the TaithCymru coach. From 25 October the new two-hourly express to Aberystwyth and Bangor will call at Carmarthen railway station on Station Road, according to the Welsh Government’s published list of stops.

Tickets go on sale on 6 October. The T1 to Aberystwyth already stops at the station.

Nathaniel Owen, TfW’s senior customer operations manager at Carmarthen, said the coach launch made it “definitely the right time for us to understand what improvements at Carmarthen railway station would enhance the overall customer experience”.

No money, yet

The consultation page is franker than the press release. “It’s important to remember funding isn’t guaranteed yet,” it says. “By having your say you can help us support our case to secure funding to propose improvements based on your feedback.”

So there is no designed or costed scheme; the ten-question survey is being used to build the case for one.

TfW’s release calls the station “a key interchange between TrawsCymru coach services and the rail network” and one of the busiest in the region, linking the town to trains for Swansea, Cardiff, Manchester and London and to Pembrokeshire.

Mr Owen said: “We really want to hear the thoughts of the people who care most about Carmarthen railway station: the people who use it. Your views will help us shape its future as a gateway to west Wales.”

The line that closed, and what’s been funded

Traws Link Cymru has campaigned since 2013 to reopen the Carmarthen to Aberystwyth railway, closed in the Beeching cuts; a 2018 Welsh Government study priced it at £775m and judged it only “socially viable”. The £2m committed to TaithCymru covers one year of running, with a decision on a second to follow.

Eight coaches have been bought for the route, which follows the T1 corridor through Lampeter and Aberaeron before heading north, and the government says the run to Bangor should take under five hours. The first coach was shown off at Bangor station in August.

The region’s transport map, which went to councillors this month, puts west Wales station upgrades in a later phase with no funding attached, and this year’s £24.7m regional pot is paying for a new bus and rail interchange at Llanelli.

Carmarthen is getting smaller council-side sums from the Welsh Government‘s regional transport grants for this year: £200,000 for an active travel route through the station and £175,000 for a cycle hub in the town.

The station has two platforms, a booking office, staff around the clock, a changing places toilet, car and cycle parking and a help point, TfW’s page says.

The survey takes five to ten minutes and is open to anyone who travels to, from or through Carmarthen, including people who don’t use the station at all.

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LITTER: You could be fined for rubbish thrown from your car even if you weren’t in it, and fly-tippers could face £5,000

If a burger box flies out of your car window on the M4 and a council officer sees it, you could be the one who pays: whether you threw it, your passenger did, or you were not in the car at all. That is the change the Welsh Government is asking about, and it wants answers by 14 October.

The same consultation asks whether the maximum on-the-spot fine for fly-tipping should rise from £400 to £5,000, and whether the fine for handing your rubbish to an unlicensed man with a van should go from £300 to £400.

Why councils say their hands are tied

Throwing litter from a car is already a crime, with a fine of up to £2,500 in court. The problem, the government’s own paper says, is proving who did it: with two or more people in a moving car an officer often cannot tell, and the registered keeper does not have to say.

England already fines the keeper directly and Scotland is about to, as a civil penalty rather than a criminal one, so no court and no record. The paper admits Wales consulted on doing the same in 2017, found “strong support”, and then dropped the Bill that would have brought it in.

Llyr Gruffydd, the cabinet minister for rural resilience and sustainability, said: “It’s often impossible to prove who in a car threw litter out, so councils’ hands are tied even when they know it’s happened.”

Keep Wales Tidy surveys last year, quoted in the paper, found litter on nearly every main road in Wales: sweet wrappers on 81% of roads surveyed, drinks containers on 72% and fast-food packaging on 67%.

6,915 dumps, 103 fines

Councils in Swansea, Neath Port Talbot and Carmarthenshire recorded 6,915 fly-tipping incidents in 2024/25, according to Welsh Government figures, and issued 103 fixed penalty notices between them. That is one fine for every 67 dumps.

Swansea’s 2,860 incidents were up 15% on the year and 61% on four years ago, and 2,308 of them were on the roadside. The council issued 25 fixed penalties and, for the second year running, recorded no prosecutions in the official statistics; in March it told councillors it had dealt with 2,579 incidents and brought five prosecutions, a different count of the same year.

Neath Port Talbot’s 884 incidents were up 40% on 633 the year before, though still below the 1,102 of 2021/22. It issued 39 fixed penalties and prosecuted twice, and it is the council that crushes fly-tippers’ vans. In July a Morriston man who admitted dumping oil-covered car parts along two miles of road between Crynant and Cilfrew was fined £200, the same figure as the standard fixed penalty, plus costs.

Carmarthenshire recorded 3,171 incidents, up 3% but well down from 4,803 four years ago, and prosecuted nine people, all of whom were fined, the third highest tally in Wales. Its fixed penalties fell from 149 to 39 in a year. Its new bin rulebook, signed off on Monday, sets out the ladder of letter, warden, notice and fine before anyone reaches court.

What a £5,000 fine would mean

Councils have told the government the £400 ceiling is no longer a deterrent, and in some cases costs less than getting rid of the rubbish legally. English councils can already fine up to £5,000, and Welsh councils have said the gap invites people to cross the border to dump. The £200 default would stay, the ceiling would rise, and councils would not have to use it.

Seven in ten fly-tips in Wales are household waste, black bags and the like, and in Swansea it is 72%. That is why the duty-of-care fine is going up too: if you pay someone to take your rubbish away and it ends up in a lane, the law says it is your problem.

Also in the paper

The proposals sit inside a wider white paper that would give ministers a legal duty to “rural proof” their policies. It names Carmarthenshire as one of nine rural councils in Wales; Swansea and Neath Port Talbot are not on the list. There are also tougher powers on illegal tree felling and civil fines for Natural Resources Wales to use.

The government says no decision has been made and no Bill has been drafted; it is asking for views and evidence first. The consultation is open until 14 October on the Welsh Government website.

“No-one likes litter,” Mr Gruffydd said. “Roadside rubbish makes an area unsightly, impacts our local economies and communities, and poses risks to the environment and to wildlife. I’d encourage everyone to give us their views and help us clean up our roadsides.”

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Neath Port Talbot crushes fly-tippers’ vehicles as crackdown intensifies
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Fly-tipping
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I link to my recent letter to Wales' Education Minister with two proposals on learners use of generative AI, and moving forward with the Digital Competence Framework (DCF).
Any thoughts?

#DCF #generativeai #ai #Wales #education #primaryschool #welshgovernment #uk

https://drive.proton.me/urls/R6D4Q4HYK8#xmcqteiBqCPE

https://www.headinthecloud.wales/2026/08/generative-ai-and-dcf-proposals-letter.html

Link to my blog version here

www.headinthecloud.wales/2026/08/gene...

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Generative AI and DCF Proposal...

I link to my recent letter to Wales' Education Minister with two proposals on learners use of generative AI, and moving forward with the Digital Competence Framework (DCF).
Any thoughts?

drive.proton.me/urls/R6D4Q4H...

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Generative AI and DCF Proposal...

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PEMBROKESHIRE: Welsh ministers seize DARC radar decision days before council vote

The decision on the US military’s planned DARC radar array in Pembrokeshire has been taken out of the county council’s hands.

Siân Gwenllian MS, the Cabinet Minister for Local Government, Housing and Planning, has “called in” the planning application (ref 25/1101/PA) for the Deep Space Advanced Radar Concept site at Cawdor Barracks, Brawdy, near St Davids — meaning it will now be decided by Welsh ministers rather than Pembrokeshire County Council.

The council’s planning committee had been due to determine the application for 27 giant radar dishes at its meeting next Tuesday, 28 July.

The direction, issued by the Welsh Government’s planning directorate under the Cabinet Minister’s authority on Monday, says she concluded the proposed development “raises national security issues given the strategic defence nature of the proposal and is a novel planning issue”.

The letter says the proposal “potentially conflicts with national policy in relation to landscape, ecology, sustainability and placemaking”, and that a decision “may be controversial beyond the immediate locality”.

“All these matters lead the Cabinet Minister to conclude the development is of more than local importance and the application should be determined by the Welsh Ministers,” it concludes.

The letter stresses that the call-in “does not imply or infer any view from the Welsh Ministers about the merits of the application” — under Welsh Government policy, a call-in decides who determines an application, not whether permission should be granted.

The letter also lists the concerns raised by those requesting the call-in — including fears the development would make the area a military target, claims the county council is “not suitably equipped” to decide an application of this nature, and the effect on an “irreplaceable habitat” for grassland fungi.

The intervention is exactly what campaigners asked the new Plaid Cymru-led government to do — a demand put to ministers in May as the campaign warned of a Wales versus Westminster showdown over the scheme.

The pressure on ministers had been building for months: in April, the then first minister called for a halt to the project, citing Donald Trump’s “contempt for our country”.

PARC Against DARC, the campaign group set up in 2024 to fight the proposal, described the call-in as a “seismic and significant step”.

A spokesperson for the campaign said DARC was “a proposal for a huge 27-dish radar array overlooking the St Davids Peninsula of the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park”, pointing to objections the group says have been lodged by the National Park Authority and Natural Resources Wales over its visual impact and harm to tourism.

The campaign says a freedom of information request showed the council received 1,121 objections to the scheme — and just one submission in favour — while almost 20,000 people have signed a petition against it.

The group claims the radar is part of a “weapons system designed to track and target satellites”, developed for the US Space Force, and could form part of Donald Trump’s proposed “Golden Dome” missile-defence programme — describing it as an escalation in the militarisation of space.

The Ministry of Defence has said DARC will detect, track and identify objects in deep space, with the Brawdy site forming part of a three-nation network alongside installations in the US and Australia under the Aukus partnership.

DARC would keep Cawdor Barracks open beyond its planned 2028 closure date — an extension of the base’s life that was welcomed locally when first proposed.

Opposition to the plans has drawn wider attention, with Game of Thrones actor Jerome Flynn backing the campaign during this year’s Senedd election.

The campaign also says it holds a letter of support sent by Neil Kinnock during a similar anti-radar fight at Brawdy in the 1990s — noting that his son, Stephen Kinnock, is now Welsh Secretary as the scheme heads for a decision at government level.

A demonstration planned for outside Tuesday’s planning committee meeting will now go ahead as a vigil “in support of Welsh Government’s call-in decision”, campaigners said.

The application now passes to Planning and Environment Decisions Wales, with the council to be told the process for the decision “as soon as possible”.

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FOOD: Llanarthne restaurateur chosen to lead Wales’ first national food strategy

The man behind one of Carmarthenshire’s best-known food destinations has been chosen to lead a new national plan for what Wales grows, sells and eats.

Simon Wright, owner of Wright’s Food Emporium in Llanarthne, will chair the expert group advising the Welsh Government on its first National Food Strategy — announced today at the Royal Welsh Show.

The strategy is meant to join up how food is handled across Wales — from farming, processing and shops through to what’s served in schools and hospitals, and how children learn about food.

The Welsh Government says the country’s food and drink supply chain is worth more than £28 billion and employs one in six Welsh workers, and that the strategy will look at what’s working, where the gaps are, and how to keep more of the value of Welsh food in Wales.

Wright has spent more than 30 years in Welsh food and hospitality. Before opening the Emporium — the deli and restaurant that has made the small village of Llanarthne a destination in its own right — he edited the AA Restaurant Guide and spent a decade as the restaurant consultant on Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares.

He was named Food Ambassador for Wales in 2010, and was appointed Professor of Practice at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David in 2021.

Last year he co-founded Cegin y Bobl, a charity teaching food skills in schools and communities alongside Welsh food historian Carwyn Graves — a cause we’ve covered previously when Halen Môn launched a seasoning in its support.

“Wales punches well above its weight in food and drink, but there’s so much more we can do,” Wright said. “This is a real opportunity to cut through and get things right for our industry and the country.

“I welcome the ambition of the new Government, and I look forward to working with producers, businesses and communities to make it happen.”

Cabinet Minister for Rural Resilience and Sustainability Llŷr Gruffydd, who made the announcement at the showground, said Welsh farmers produce “sustainable, high-quality food” and the strategy would bring the whole system together — “from our farmers and fishers to our retailers, schools and communities”.

He said Wright’s “passion for Welsh food and deep roots in the industry” made him exactly the right person for the role.

The expert group will advise only — it has no legal powers — and will make recommendations on the challenges facing Welsh food, how to measure success, and how government and industry work together long-term.

Nothing changes on the shelves yet: the strategy is one of the new government’s 100-day commitments, but the finished plan isn’t expected to reach ministers until sometime in 2027.

The announcement came a day after the Welsh Government used the same Royal Welsh platform to promise farmers more than £1bn over the Senedd term in a multi-year funding deal — with the food strategy the second half of its pitch to rural Wales this week.

For Llanarthne, it means the village’s best-known food business will have a hand in shaping what lands on plates across Wales for years to come.

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FARM FUNDING: Welsh farmers promised £1bn over Senedd term in multi-year deal

The family farms of Carmarthenshire and the wider region have been handed the multi-year funding certainty they have been asking for — but the amount on the table is already being challenged as a real-terms cut.

The Welsh Government announced at the Royal Welsh Show on Monday that the Sustainable Farming Scheme will be funded at £340 million a year for three years, until March 2030.

It means Welsh farmers will receive more than £1 billion across this Senedd term, a commitment the Plaid Cymru government says fulfils a pledge made in its first 100 days in power.

Of the annual pot, a guaranteed £238 million goes to the scheme’s Universal layer — the baseline payment most farms will claim — with £102 million for the Optional and Collaborative layers covering environmental and habitat work.

The move ends the year-to-year funding model that has dogged the sector since Brexit. The UK’s departure from the EU stripped away the stability of the bloc’s seven-year financial framework, leaving Welsh farm support to be set one year at a time.

Cabinet Minister for Rural Resilience and Sustainability Llŷr Gruffydd made the announcement — his first major intervention since taking the portfolio — at the showground in Llanelwedd.

“Giving farmers only 12 months’ line of sight to funding is not sufficient,” Gruffydd said. “We know how hard it is to plan and make business decisions without knowing what funding is coming.”

He added: “Farmers told us loud and clear they need certainty and stability — and that is exactly what we are delivering.”

The Minister also announced early moves to cut red tape, following initial feedback from an independent review into the bureaucratic burden on family farms led by John Davies.

Chief among them is a simplification of the Animal Health Improvement Cycle within the Universal layer. From 2027, farmers in an aligned farm assurance scheme will complete a single form covering both assurance and scheme compliance, delivering both from one vet visit.

The Welsh Government also confirmed that applications for Organic Conversion and a “Capital: Production and Efficiency” grant category open from the end of July, with the Small Woodland Creation and Woodland Creation grant windows opening from 20 July.

The Farmers’ Union of Wales, which met the First Minister at the show on Monday morning, welcomed the multi-year commitment while pressing for more.

FUW President Ian Rickman said recent years had brought “significant financial uncertainty” that made it hard for farm businesses to plan. He said the union had consistently called for a five-year funding framework, and that certainty until March 2030 was “a welcomed relief for the family farms of Wales”.

But Rickman signalled the fight over the amount is not over, saying the union would continue to press for an increase to the scheme’s base-level funding “to mitigate any economic impacts and match the policy ambitions of the Welsh Government”.

The opposition went further. Welsh Conservative shadow farming minister Andrew RT Davies said the £340 million figure was the same the sector had received since 2012 and amounted to a substantial real-terms cut once inflation was taken into account.

Davies said farming and environment groups had warned that £500 million a year was needed, and accused the government of finding money for other priorities while failing to “fund Welsh farming adequately”.

Reform Wales echoed the criticism on the figure. The party’s shadow rural affairs secretary Laura Anne Jones said multi-year certainty was welcome “but certainty alone is not enough”, arguing that £340 million still fell “well short of what many farms require”.

Monday’s announcement is the latest chapter in a scheme that has been years in the making. The Welsh Government unveiled the final Sustainable Farming Scheme in July 2025 amid opposition warnings over food security, and last year used the same Royal Welsh platform to launch £33m in transition support for farmers preparing to move onto the new system.

For the farms of Carmarthenshire, mid Wales and beyond, the settlement answers the question of how long the money is guaranteed. Whether it stretches far enough is the argument now taking shape for the rest of the decade.

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CANCER STRATEGY: ‘It cannot become another document that sits on a shelf’ — children’s cancer charity’s message as Wales plans its first national strategy in 20 years

A children’s cancer charity that has stood beside hundreds of families across south Wales has welcomed plans for the country’s first national cancer strategy in two decades — with a warning attached.

“For the families we support, this cannot simply become another document that sits on a shelf,” Morgan’s Army said in a statement responding to the announcement.

The charity was founded by the family of Morgan Ridler, who died of cancer aged just three — a little boy whose story moved thousands across Wales, with tributes from rugby stars, TV presenters and communities far beyond his hometown.

Led by Morgan’s mum Natalie Ridler, it now provides practical, emotional and financial help to families dealing with childhood cancer — and each April the Gorseinon 10K turns the town into a sea of colour in his memory, drawing more than 800 runners.

In its statement, the charity said it had seen parents forced to choose between earning a wage and being at their child’s bedside, siblings quietly putting their own childhoods on hold, and families travelling hundreds of miles for treatment “worrying about where they’ll sleep and how they’ll pay for tomorrow”.

“These are the realities that don’t always appear in statistics, but they shape every family’s cancer journey,” it said.

For the strategy to matter, the charity said, it must mean earlier diagnoses, faster access to treatment, better support for children’s cancer services, practical help with travel and accommodation, compassionate psychological support — and “care that recognises every member of the family, not just the patient”.

“If this strategy can spare even one family from unnecessary suffering, reduce even one delay in diagnosis, or make one parent’s journey a little less lonely, then it has the potential to leave a legacy that reaches far beyond healthcare.”

The first national strategy since 2006

The Welsh Government announced this week it is developing a 10-year National Cancer Strategy to transform how the disease is prevented, diagnosed and treated in Wales.

Cancer is Wales’s biggest killer, and one in two people will be affected in their lifetime — yet the government itself acknowledges the performance of cancer services “continues to lag behind where it should be”.

Cabinet Minister for Health and Care Mabon ap Gwynfor said a lack of national direction had “compromised the fight against cancer for too long” — Wales has not had a national cancer strategy since 2006.

“In the two decades since, treatments have transformed, diagnostic technology has advanced, the needs of our population have changed, and our understanding of cancer has deepened dramatically,” he said.

The strategy promises a focus on prevention, earlier diagnosis and “optimal pathways” for every cancer type from diagnosis to end-of-life care — with strengthened accountability so that, in the government’s words, a person’s postcode no longer determines the quality of their care.

A formal call for evidence will give patients, carers, clinicians, charities and the public a direct role in shaping it, alongside the Wales Cancer Alliance’s more than thirty member charities and international partners including the European Cancer Organisation.

Publication is timed for World Cancer Day — 4 February 2027.

Help with travel already on the way

One measure already in motion speaks directly to Morgan’s Army’s plea: work has begun on a travel and accommodation fund for children and young people attending cancer appointments.

The government is also developing “Right to be Forgotten” principles to help cancer survivors access financial services such as insurance, and commissioning a feasibility study for a new Rapid Diagnostic Centre in Powys.

Mr ap Gwynfor said: “For patients waiting too long for diagnosis, for families in rural communities who face greater barriers to care, and for the clinicians working hard to deliver world-class treatment with insufficient national coordination, this strategy matters.”

The region’s cancer infrastructure has been in the news throughout the summer: NHS Wales wants to turn a former DVLA call centre at Swansea Vale into a factory making injectable cancer medicines, while a Bridgend woman who packed her own bag before chemotherapy at Singleton is now making “Bailey’s Bags” for others starting treatment.

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BROADCASTING: Wales’ new media watchdog won’t exist until 2028 — as critics call it “constitutional navel-gazing”

Wales is getting a new broadcasting body — but not until 2028, and its first form will be a working group advising on how to set it up.

Culture minister Heledd Fychan set out the timetable for a Shadow Broadcasting and Communications Authority for Wales in a written statement on Wednesday, meeting the Plaid Cymru government’s pledge to publish plans within its first 100 days.

The authority is intended to protect and strengthen public service media in Wales — and the Welsh Government says it is the first step towards pressing for broadcasting powers to be devolved from Westminster.

What actually happens, and when

The first step is a working group. Recruitment for its members starts in September, with the group expected to hold its first meeting early in 2027.

Fychan says she expects detailed recommendations on the authority’s structure, status and remit early in 2028, with a formal decision confirmed in spring 2028.

She has set aside £45,000 from Creative Wales’ budget to fund the work this financial year.

That means the “shadow” authority itself — a body watching over broadcasting in Wales without yet holding formal powers — is at least two years away, with the working group doing the design work in between.

“Completely unnecessary”

The plan has vocal critics in the Senedd — Fychan’s statement acknowledges “concerns expressed by some Members”.

Reform UK’s shadow culture minister Louise Emery called the authority “completely unnecessary” in a Senedd debate last month, describing the government’s culture plans as “more constitutional navel-gazing, more quangos, more slow state-building towards independence, and more cost.”

Welsh Conservative culture spokesperson Paul Davies questioned the spending. “Surely this is not the best possible use of resources, especially given that these powers are not devolved,” he told the Senedd, pressing the minister on how much the body would cost and how it would operate.

The previous Labour government considered the same central recommendation — made by an Expert Panel on Broadcasting in 2023 — and stopped short, opting for an advisory group rather than a shadow authority. The Plaid government is going further than its predecessor was willing to.

“Plans agreed for and about us”

Fychan says the case rests on evidence that a UK-wide broadcasting framework “does not cater to the realities of how a devolved UK operates”, pointing to backing from the Institute of Welsh Affairs and the Independent Commission on the Constitutional Future of Wales.

Her statement singles out the UK Government’s new Local Media Fund — support for local journalism designed in Westminster — as “the latest example of plans agreed for and about us, where we have no role in how those plans are shaped and implemented.”

Broadcasting and communications are currently reserved to Westminster, with services like S4C and BBC Wales operating under UK-wide frameworks — the structures the authority would eventually scrutinise from a Welsh vantage point.

Fychan says she is “certain that any resource channelled towards a Shadow Broadcasting and Communications Authority for Wales will pay dividends.”

Whether it survives contact with the Senedd arithmetic is another question — the government lost its first budget vote 49–44 on Tuesday night, and every spending line now faces a chamber where it lacks a majority.

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SWANSEA: SA1 finally gets its park — as the pupils who helped design it cut the ribbon

SA1 has a park. Pupils from St Thomas Primary and Danygraig Primary cut the ribbon on it on Monday morning with Swansea Council leader Rob Stewart.

The site near Prince of Wales Dock had stood empty since the area was developed. It now has play equipment, landscaped areas, seating and accessible paths, with planting the council says is designed to support wildlife and pollinators.

The children helped design it. Swansea Council says its landscape team worked with its play team and drew on ideas and feedback from pupils at both schools.

“It has also been shaped with help from local schoolchildren, which makes it even more special,” Rob Stewart said. “Their ideas have helped create a space that reflects the community it will serve.”

From coal dock to climbing frame

The scheme was paid for from Section 106 contributions — money developers hand over to fund community infrastructure as an area is built out.

The dock the park overlooks was built in 1881, when Swansea’s coal and copper trades were at full tilt. The Prince of Wales Dock worked for a century before the port trade around it fell away.

The Welsh Development Agency began turning the former dockland into the SA1 district in the early 2000s, owning the land and marketing the plots. When the WDA was abolished in April 2006 the land passed to the Welsh Government — which still owns SA1’s land and roads today, not the council.

Twenty years on, the agency is heading for a comeback. A panel to design a revived WDA was announced this month, one of the new Welsh Government’s flagship commitments.

A long time coming

The Section 106 funding has been sitting behind these parks for some time.

In June last year the council said work was under way on two SA1 parks, costing in the region of £1m, and that both were due to be fully open to the public by early 2026.

They were not. The first opened on Monday morning.

The one now open is the larger of the pair, on Langdon Road near the Village Hotel.

The second park

The second was to sit between Langdon Road and the corner of Prince of Wales Dock — the council’s 2025 announcement promised it a pump track, open green space and wildflowers. It is not mentioned in this week’s announcement, and no date has been given for it.

The council’s 2025 description of the larger park also promised a basketball space and play facilities for children with disabilities. This week’s announcement lists play equipment and natural play features, and does not say whether those went in.

The row that ran alongside the diggers

The delay has been politically live, and the man making the case is the park’s own ward member. Liberal Democrat councillor Sam Bennett, who represents Waterfront, said last year that residents had been promised a park in SA1 for a decade, and that every date given had come and gone.

Cllr Bennett claimed £1m had been set aside for three parks in SA1 when the area was first developed, and that more than ten years on all three plots were undeveloped and being used as builders’ compounds.

Rob Stewart called those comments “pretty disingenuous and misleading” at the time. He said work on two parks was well under way, and suggested the criticism was the opening of Cllr Bennett’s Senedd election campaign.

Then Welsh Liberal Democrat leader Jane Dodds backed Cllr Bennett, saying many SA1 residents live in flats and town houses without gardens.

Both men went on to stand in May’s Senedd election, against each other. Neither was elected, and both remain Swansea councillors.

Cllr Bennett flagged the opening on Facebook on 7 July, six days before it happened and eight before the council announced it. Residents should get down there and be first on the new swings, he wrote.

Swansea’s second new park in a century

The new park is the city’s second in recent years. Amy Dillwyn Park, next to Swansea Arena, was the first new urban park in Swansea for a century, according to the council. That park doubles as the largest green roof in Wales.

“It will be a fantastic addition to SA1 and is another example of our vision to continue providing communities with the things they want that support their wellbeing and our natural environment,” Rob Stewart said.

The council says the park is part of wider work on public space in SA1, alongside a £3m programme of new skate and wheeled sports facilities across the city. Horizon Engineering Ltd was the main contractor.

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LAUGHARNE: Wales’ oyster comeback starts on the Taf — as town lands share of £540,000 coastal fund

Laugharne is set to become the engine room of Wales’ native oyster revival.

The township on the Taf estuary will host a purpose-built oyster spatting pond — a biosecure nursery producing juvenile oysters, known as spat, for reef restoration and sustainable aquaculture projects across the country.

It is one of seven coastal community projects sharing £540,761 from the Welsh Government’s Coastal Capacity Building Fund, announced today (Wednesday 8 July).

The Laugharne pond is the only successful bid in south west Wales, with the other six projects spread across Ceredigion, Conwy, Flintshire, Gwynedd and Ynys Môn.

Native oysters were once big business on this stretch of coast. Mumbles supported one of Britain’s largest oyster fisheries in the 19th century before overfishing and disease all but wiped the beds out — and wild native oysters remain scarce around the Welsh coast today.

Restoration projects need a reliable, disease-free supply of young oysters to rebuild reefs — which is exactly what the Laugharne pond is designed to provide.

Oyster reefs filter seawater, provide habitat for other marine life and can help protect coastlines — which is why restoring them has become a priority for marine conservationists across the UK.

Llyr Gruffydd, Cabinet Minister for Rural Resilience and Sustainability, said Wales’ coastal communities were “the custodians of our richest marine environments” and the funding backed their work to protect them for future generations.

“From restoring native oysters in Laugharne to monitoring marine mammals off the Gwynedd coast, these projects show what local knowledge and community action can achieve,” he said.

The minister added: “We’re investing in clean seas, strong aquaculture and fisheries supply chains and resilient coastal economies — because Wales’s coastline is one of our greatest assets.”

The fund is delivered by Wales Council for Voluntary Action on behalf of the Welsh Government, under a contract running since 2023.

Competition for the money was fierce — 13 applications worth more than £1m were submitted, with seven selected.

Elsewhere, the fund will pay for a community-led marine monitoring hub in Cardigan Bay, a sustainable seafood trail in Conwy, harbour improvements at Connah’s Quay and Amlwch, and enhanced marine mammal monitoring in Gwynedd under the Clust i’r Môr initiative.

Six projects funded in the 2025 round are in their second and final year, worth a combined £259,521 this financial year.

The health of Carmarthenshire‘s coastal waters — and the shellfish that depend on them — has long been contested ground: four men were fined £36,000 this spring after an illegal late-night cockle raid on the Burry Inlet, while volunteers testing bathing waters around Gower found sewage at beaches after heavy rain despite most sites rating good or excellent.

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Kit Peters

Kit Peters is a journalist and the editor of Swansea Bay News, covering Swansea, Neath Port Talbot and Carmarthenshire since 2020.

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https://newsletter.tf/welsh-government-youth-justice-control-2026/

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https://newsletter.tf/welsh-government-youth-justice-control-2026/