Category: Housing Associations

The Privatisation of Welsh Housing Associations

On By JacIn Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Demographics, Devolution, Housing Associations, Local Government, Public Funding, Social Housing, Welsh Assembly, Welsh Government, Welsh Labour36 Comments

THE GREAT MYSTERY OF HOUSING ASSOCIATIONS

I have written about housing associations dozens of times. One of the many things that intrigued me was their legal status – were they public bodies or private companies? For on the one hand they enjoyed the benefit of public funding (and lots of it), yet were exempt from public scrutiny and Freedom of Information legislation, just like private companies.

From my inquiries into housing associations I concluded that they enjoyed the best of both worlds.

But this idyll was threatened in late 2015 when the Office for National Statistics surprised us all by deciding that – by falling into line with EU accounting rules – Registered Social Landlords (the more official name for housing associations) in England should be reclassified from Private Non-Financial Corporations to Public Non-Financial Corporations. (Wales and Scotland would also be affected.)

This certainly surprised me, and the revelation that housing associations were regarded as private companies also surprised those who had innocently assumed that publicly-funded providers of social housing, owning for the most part stock they had inherited from local authorities, were already public bodies.

From the Guardian, October 2015, click to enlarge

In addition to surprising some, the change also annoyed a number of people, not least the man in No 11 Downing Street, because it meant that £60bn of housing association debt would be added to the UK’s public indebtedness. Within the sector there were concerns that reclassification would mean, among other things, that housing associations would now be open to public scrutiny.

But if nothing else, this move by the ONS clarified the status of these mysterious bodies. They had been private, the ONS wanted to make them public, and now the race was on to find a way of reversing the ONS decision.

England led the way and in November 2017 the ONS announced that once the new measures had passed into law housing associations would be reclassified once again as private bodies. Wales followed suit in June this year with the Regulation of Registered Social Landlords (Wales) Act 2018. Despite the title, the purpose of this legislation is in fact to deregulate housing associations so that there is no possibility of them being considered public bodies.

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ALL CHANGE

Before delving into the Act, let me make a few things clear. It would be easy to think that if housing associations were private bodies that were briefly deemed to be public bodies by the ONS and are now reclassified as private, then surely we’re back where we started? Er, no . . . there have been many changes, significant and worrying changes.

These are encapsulated in ‘About the Bill’ in the ‘Overview’ introduction to the legislation, where it says:

click to enlarge

It tells us clearly that to satisfy the Office for National Statistics “The purpose of the Bill is to amend or remove those powers which are deemed by the Office for National Statistics (“ONS”) to demonstrate central and local government control over Registered Social Landlords (RSLs).”

For those who find it difficult to wade through the full legislation (which I guess is some 99% of us) here’s a more manageable ‘Guide’ in which I’ve highlighted certain sections that I shall now focus on in order to discuss what I consider to be a very worrying direction of travel.

Let’s turn to the highlighted document.

Paragraphs 13, 15, 18 and 20 all list circumstances or situations in which housing associations no longer need the consent of ‘Welsh Ministers’. This is not a reference to a conclave of Nonconformist preachers but to the clowns down Cardiff docks who want us to think of them as the ‘Welsh Government’. (In reality they are just England’s management team in Wales.)

In practice, it means that a Registered Social Landlord in Wales is now free to make any change it likes to its rules, merge with another company, transfer its “engagements” (assets?) to another company, or go into liquidation, all without needing the approval of the ‘Welsh Ministers’.

Paragraphs 33 and 34 however gives the ‘Welsh Ministers’ power to both remove and appoint officers of RSLs, even if that housing association is a company. Which strikes me as a little odd, and would appear to contradict the expressed objective of removing the powers of local and central government.

As do paragraphs 40, 42 and 43 which also give or retain powers for the ‘Welsh Ministers’. These include the right to compel a RSL “to transfer management functions to a person specified by them (the ‘Welsh Ministers’)”. They can also appoint a manager and forcibly amalgamate RSLs.

Further paragraphs are in the same vein until we come to 61, which is worth thinking about, for it gives the ‘Welsh Ministers’ the power to show favouritism to certain housing associations at the expense of others.

Paragraph 63 suggests that housing associations are now free to hide “disposal proceeds” in the accounts, proceeds that will almost certainly have been paid for out of public funds. What’s more, ‘Welsh Ministers’ have no say in how the money – public money – is to be used.

click to enlarge

Paragraphs 64, 71, 73 and 78 reiterate that local authorities – that is, the democratically elected bodies serving the areas in which housing associations operate – no longer have any influence in the running of RSLs.

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WHAT WILL IT MEAN IN PRACTICE?

In a nutshell, Serendipity presented the ‘Welsh’ Government with an opportunity to extend its power in areas where the Labour Party is as popular as Boris Johnson at a Remoaner Wail-in and Carwyn and his gang grabbed the chance with both hands.

Or to look at it from another angle, an allegedly socialist political party has no qualms about privatising bodies holding and managing public assets.

Let’s deal with the power grab first. Despite being the party with the most MPs and AMs, and the party of power in Cardiff docks, Labour controls just twelve of Wales’ twenty-two local authorities. And none in the south west, the north west or the centre.

As I’ve explained on this blog a number of times, Labour overcomes its lack of representation – and consequently influence – through the power of patronage and funding. The third sector being a prime example, controlled via public funding dished out by the Labour management team in Cardiff docks the third sector is stuffed with Labour’s cronies and operates across the country. Whether it’s the Citizens Advice Bureau in Gwynedd or one of the countless ‘homelessness’ charities fighting over rough sleepers Labour uses the third sector to give it influence in areas where it has little electoral support.

The same can be said of housing associations. There are certain RSLs aligned with Labour and these are rewarded with extra funding and encouragement to take over housing associations that are not run by Labour Party supporters. One example I’ve dealt with a number of times was the takeover of Cantref, based in Castell Newydd Emlyn, by Wales and West Housing of Cardiff, run by the wife of a Cardiff Labour councillor. (A woman who insists on appearing in almost every photograph.)

One curb on the excesses of such Labour shenanigans was the involvement of local, non-Labour councillors, in the running of housing associations operating on their patch. But as we’ve seen, the new Act removes that involvement.

click to enlarge

But the Act entrenches the power of the ‘Welsh’ Government to interfere of behalf of Labour-connected RSLs. For example, it’s no secret that Wales and West wants to take over Tai Ceredigion. The minister responsible could remove Tai Ceredigion’s CEO, replace him with a Labour stooge, who could then announce that the best option for Tai Ceredigion would be a merger with Wales and West Housing.

I’ve focused on Wales and West but I could have mentioned any number of other housing associations that are obviously Labour in their political orientation but tend to operate in one area, unlike Wales and West, which has a national reach, active in 15 of our 22 local authority areas.

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GYPSY JAC GAZES INTO HIS CRYSTAL BALL

With housing associations deregulated, local authority influence removed, and the Labour Party able to control the whole shooting match, Wales could be facing a bleak future.

Let’s take Gwynedd, an area where Labour’s support is largely limited to academics and students around the alien university in Bangor. In the near future Cartrefi Cymunedol Gwynedd (which inherited Gwynedd’s social housing stock) could be taken over by Labour Party appointees, who then sign contracts with English local authorities and RSLs to help them bring down their waiting lists for social housing. Something the new legislation allows RSLs to do.

So Cartrefi Cymunedol Gwynedd goes on a building spree with borrowed money.

But it eventually becomes clear that Cartrefi Cymunedol Gwynedd has bitten off more than it can chew and it goes into voluntary liquidation owing millions of pounds to lenders. So who is now responsible for that debt? Is it the ‘Welsh’ Government – in other words, you and me?

One of the objections to the reclassification as public bodies was that such a move would restrict housing associations’ ability to borrow money. Though Welsh RSLs have in the past borrowed very little from commercial lenders – that wasn’t repaid by the ‘Welsh’ Government – because they don’t need to. They have the guaranteed income from their housing stock, a stock that in most cases was paid for out of public funds, and as we know, this income is supplemented by handouts from the ‘Welsh’ Government.

So what becomes of these handouts now? Will deregulated private housing associations still receive public funding every year?

Will this and other grants still be paid to our now privatised housing associations, or is it time for another update? (Click to enlarge.)

Another consideration might be that Welsh RSLs are also free to enter into agreements with those London boroughs currently engaged in social cleansing. Which could mean that a Welsh RSL in receipt of your money would be helping move people from London to Wales.

The new Act also allows RSLs to dispose of their ‘engagements’ and land assets. So what redress is there if, for example, Mid Wales Housing sells off land or property to RSLs based in the English West Midlands and these bodies then move many of their less ‘sociable’ tenants into places like Meifod and Llanwrtyd?

Clearly, the temptation is now there for Welsh RSLs to borrow unwisely and to over-extend themselves, which may well serve a certain agenda.

I say that because most people agree that we have too many housing associations. There are ten operating in Neath Port Talbot, six in Conwy, and no less than fifteen in Cardiff.

Obviously, the total number must be reduced, and the new Act makes it easier to undermine RSLs not favoured by Labour – as was done with Cantref – and to force through mergers. Which is what I predict will happen in the coming years, and it will be justified in the name of ‘rationalisation’.

What will be glossed over is the fact that the only housing associations left standing at the end of this process will be those run by Labour Party members and supporters. For make no mistake, the Regulation of Registered Social Landlords (Wales) Act 2018 gives the Labour Party more opportunities to extend its malign influence through giving its hangers-on preferential treatment.

But this is how a one-party state operates – supporters are rewarded and non-supporters compromised or intimidated.

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LABOUR’S NUCLEAR OPTION

But the starkest and most dangerous reminder of the one-party state could, paradoxically, come when most people think the power of the Labour Party in Wales has finally been broken. A case of the cornered beast.

I can see a situation, maybe as early as the Assembly elections of 2021, that sees Labour without a majority and unable to cobble together a coalition. The ‘Welsh’ Labour Party will then be in opposition down Cardiff docks.

It is at this point that all the scheming and placements, all the bribes and sinecures, bear fruit, and all the favours will be called in. For it will be when Labour is in opposition that we see the benefit of having a bloated third sector, of filling housing associations with its people, of generally building up a network of supporters and funding recipients, everyone from Mrs Tiggy-Winkle’s Hedgehog Rescue Service to Côr Meibion Cwmscwt.

For I predict with absolute certainty that when Labour loses control of the Assembly it will not accept defeat gracefully. The party will begin a campaign of guerilla warfare to undermine the new administration. Wrecking Wales will be acceptable collateral damage, because the party comes first.

Labour’s foot-soldiers in this dirty war will be its supporters in the sectors and networks the party has carefully built up over the past twenty years, including the deregulated RSLs, and these will be backed by a media that is either Labour-leaning or else a BritNat propaganda outlet for which Labour – as a Unionist party – is far more acceptable than what may have replaced Labour.

Making it easier for Wales to be made ungovernable through vindictive factionalism could be an important consequence of the Regulation of Registered Social Landlords (Wales) Act 2018.

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The Synthesis of Colonialism and Cultural Marxism in Wales

On By JacIn British Nationalism, Cardiff Bay, Civil Service, Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Cymrophobia, Demographics, Devolution, Englandandwales, English Nationalism, Environmentalism, Ethnic Cleansing, Greens, Higher Education, Housing, Housing Associations, Social Cleansing, Social Housing, Third Sector, Welsh Government, Welsh Independence, Welsh Labour, Welsh Nationalism58 Comments

I had planned a fuller article before I take myself off for a few days, but what with grandchildren staying over the weekend, and the football season now underway, I’ve had less time available than I’d hoped, and so I offer instead this little piece in which I consider one of the absurdities of twentieth century Wales.

One of many absurdities of course.

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Let’s begin by establishing our parameters.

Most people on the left would argue that colonialism is an unequal relationship between European, Christian or white peoples on the one hand, and other races or cultures on the other, and that support for colonialism exposes a rightist – even racist – outlook. I say no; any relationship in which one country or people is ruled and exploited by another country or people qualifies as colonialism.

For this leftist interpretation often ignores white on white colonialism, and almost always ignores non-white on white colonialism, such as Turkish rule over large areas of Christian Europe from the sixteenth century up until the twentieth.

Cultural Marxism, that creature of the 1960s, is the leftist control of discourse and dialogue to the extent that certain subjects become taboo, certain words are forbidden, and freedom of expression is curtained to the advantage of the left. Often known as political correctness it is a form of censorship. It is dictatorial.

In normal circumstances, and for fairly obvious reasons, colonialism and cultural Marxism find themselves on opposing sides. Yet in Wales they are allies.

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That’s because Wales is ruled by England in the interests of England. Anyone who believes otherwise, anyone who thinks we have a devolved form of government acting in the interests of Wales, is a fool. Wales is poorer, less healthy, and our children less well educated, than before devolution. (If those don’t fit, then choose your own criteria.)

Devolution has been an unmitigated disaster for the Welsh people. And for the essential Welshness of Wales.

Instead of devolution we have a management system. Senior civil servants based in Wales receive policy and other directives from their bosses in London then, in their role as advisors or whatever to the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’, they ensure that these directives become policy initiatives and legislation.

This is made easier because most Welsh people vote for left of centre parties out of self-interest or misplaced patriotism, and these parties are more susceptible to influences from groups and organisations even further to the left that care less about Wales than, paradoxically perhaps, parties of the right which should be more supportive of colonialism.

This helps explain the dominance of cultural Marxism in Welsh public and political life. It is because it fills an ideological vacuum for a whole class of politicians with no ambition beyond getting elected and keeping ‘the other side’ out. And by so doing, by piggy-backing on an ideology-free political class, leftist activists and practitioners of cultural Marxism are able to dominate Welsh political discourse and facilitate colonialism.

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Colonialism in Wales is subtle. Apart from the obvious manifestations like dams and reservoirs, colonial exploitation is largely hidden from view.

Yet one of the more obvious shows of colonialism is demographic change. To the extent that it is now quite obvious that Wales, particularly the rural areas (and to some extent the post-industrial areas), are denied an economy that might retain the indigenous population and are instead served up a curious mix of ‘initiatives’ and ‘strategies’ designed solely to attract new residents from outside of Wales.

Take tourism, no longer confined to the rural and coastal areas but now being encouraged in areas like Merthyr and the Afan valley (behind Port Talbot). What virtually all tourism enterprises have in common is that they’re English-owned (but often Welsh funded), with the best jobs going to outsiders while locals pick up the scraps in the form of low wage and seasonal employment.

Tourism in Wales is blatantly colonialist, it rapes and prostitutes our homeland for the benefit of strangers, but the left stays silent.

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Then there is the housing market, both private and social. The private sector seeks to build tens of thousands of homes that we do not need and that most of us cannot afford – homes intended for English buyers. This moves us beyond colonialism to colonisation. Which is also what we find in the social housing sector, with housing associations funded with money given to Wales prioritising dysfunctional and often dangerous applicants from outside of Wales.

Again, the left stays silent. Or rather, the left applauds; for importing a problem family from Stoke, or an ex-con from Wolverhampton, shows how ‘caring’ and socialist we are.

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One of the causes taken up by cultural Marxism since the 1960s is environmentalism, and this brings me to the most recent, and perhaps the most blatant, form of colonialism we see in Wales today. Indeed, it may be unique to Wales.

I’m referring now to how – so we are told – Wales can save the planet through policies like the One Planet Development.

Which in practice means that in twentieth century Wales we see a return to the crude, almost apartheid, system of pre-Glyndŵr times in which legislators favour those seeking to colonise Wales while discriminating against the indigenous population. But this time it’s being done by a bunch of clowns calling itself the ‘Welsh Government’!

The fundamental idiocy of this policy is that the ‘Welsh’ Government justifies the One Planet nonsense, TAN 6 and other programmes on the grounds that they will reduce Wales’ carbon footprint. But by bringing people into Wales it can only increase Wales’ carbon footprint.

This time the left isn’t just applauding – it’s doing cartwheels!

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How do we explain the left in Wales either being silent or supportive when it comes to what is obviously colonialism and colonisation? In a word, because we have no indigenous left in Wales concerned with what’s best for Wales, one divorced from external considerations.

What we have instead is a BritNat-dominated left promoting cultural Marxism from which England and English people benefit, which in turn makes leftism and cultural Marxism in Wales colonialist and self-serving. And its influence is everywhere.

It permeates the political system, the third sector, higher education, and other important elements of Welsh life giving out the same message – ‘To oppose our interpretation of what’s right and what’s wrong; to challenge our application of cultural Marxism, our takeover of your country, makes you an ugly and backward racist’.

And Plaid Cymru has fallen for this! it now takes the side of such people against its own people! Or what were its own people. For Plaid Cymru under Leanne Wood now sees itself as part of something bigger and more important than Wales.

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The Anglo-centric or mid-Atlantic left in Wales not only serves its own interests but works against ours. To begin with, and quite obviously, those I’m discussing here do not want an independent Wales. But nor do they want a return to the status quo ante-devolution.

Because devolution serves them perfectly.

For a start, the left in Wales, both English and native, has no idea how to organise a wealth-generating economy, it is ideologically opposed to the capitalist system. Consequently, a system of sham devolution, with the left having a big say in how money handed down from London is disbursed by the ever-accommodating management team in Cardiff suits them perfectly.

Socialism has failed Wales because it sought to ameliorate the effects of capitalism, unwilling to accept that it was in fact confronting colonialism. This was due to socialists viewing Wales and the world through a British and Unionist prism.

This laid the foundations upon which the system we see today was built. A system that keeps Wales poor and underprivileged in order that parasites can demand an ever bigger slice of the cake so that they can help ‘poor Wales’.

The problem facing Wales today is obvious: an entrenched system of colonialism and discrimination reinforced in recent decades – and especially since the advent of devolution – by cultural Marxism and other leftist nonsense that allows parasites to thrive on and further weaken the malnourished body of Wales. 

Let’s get rid of it all! Let’s sweep away colonialism and its supporting pillars of cultural Marxism. Let us build an independent and democratic Wales that serves the interests of our people.

♦ end ♦

 

 

Shorts 16.07.2018 (Well it is summer!)

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Conservative and Unionist Party, Corruption, Cymrophobia, Demographics, Englandandwales, English Nationalism, Environmentalism, Ethnic Cleansing, Greens, Housing Associations, Local Government, Plaid Cymru, Public Funding, Third Sector, Welsh Assembly, Welsh Government, Welsh Labour14 Comments

I’m taking a wee break from the Williams-Partridge gang, but I shall return to them, you can count on it. Weep for Wales 6 is already forming itself in the old Jac noggin.

But as the Walrus said, The time has come to talk of many things . . . but we shall not stray far from my favoured themes of shysters and charlatans, colonialists and their facilitators.

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THE GREEN, GREEN PARTY OF HOME (WHICH IS NOT WALES)

There is in Wales a political grouping calling itself the Wales Green Party. Over the years many people – myself included – have pointed out that despite the name it has no legal existence, being merely part of The Green Party (of England). Scotland has a separate party.

Those of a masochistic bent may choose to read some of my previous offerings on the subject: Plaid Cymru and the Green Party of EnglandandWales, More on the Green Party of EnglandandWales, Green Party of EnglandandWales, Wales Region AGM 2015.

This question of whether there is or should be a separate Welsh party has bedevilled the Greens in Wales for some years and so it was recently decided to lance the boil by having a vote on whether to become wholly independent or remain part of the Green Party (of England).

The result is in and 64.8% voted to remain part of the Green Party (of England), though the party leader in Wales, Grenville Ham, favoured treating Wales with respect by forming a separate party.

This result does not surprise me. The Greens I’ve met in my area, and others I know of who’ve moved to rural parts of Wales, tend to offer a ‘We know best’ kind of ‘enlightened’ colonialism. No less offensive when delivered by some malodorous little twat with a 2:2 in mycology than when it’s barked by the District Officer wearing shorts with a razor-sharp crease.

What I’m saying is that, in Wales, most Greens are English arrivals (many of them just passing through). This explains why – unlike Scotland – we do not have a separate and native Green Party. This also explains the vote I’ve just reported.

Greens in Wales must now stop the pretence that there is a Wales Green Party. There is not. What we have in Wales is the regional branch of The Green Party of England. Calling it the Green Party of England and Wales is no improvement, especially when we remember the position in Scotland.

Those who want a Welsh Green Party, those who wish to prioritise the Welsh national interest, had better do some hard thinking. A new, genuinely Welsh Green party could resonate with Welsh voters far better than the Green Party of England has done hitherto.

It could hardly do any worse.

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WHO WILL BUY MY LOVELY HOUSES? – THE ‘WELSH’ GOVERNMENT OF COURSE!

And so to Pembrokeshire, which attracts a disproportionate number of those malodorous little gits with a 2:2 in mycology. But on a higher plane, far removed from the darkness and the copious amounts of shit, we enter the realm of Sol Invictus.

And it’s there, basking in the wealth he bestows, that we find Dr Glen Peters. Formerly of bean-counters PwC but now ensconced at Rhos y Gilwen mansion near Cilgerran, where he brings culture to this benighted corner of Wales through Menter Rhosygilwen. You can even get married there.

Courtesy of Linkedin, click to enlarge

But his real interest is making money through his company Western Solar Ltd. There is a solar farm on his land and when he’s not harvesting all that lovely sunshine on his estate he’s building houses . . . to harvest more life-giving sunshine. His footnote in history being assured with Pentre Solar, an ambitious scheme at Glanrhyd.

But ere it started, the ‘Welsh’ Government bunged Peters £141,000 for a factory in which to manufacture sections for the houses. Since then, the ‘Welsh’ Government has loaned the Ateb Group, formerly Pembrokeshire Housing, £900,000 to buy the six houses from Peters.

Yet according to this account in the Guardian, just four of the properties, ‘have “affordable” rents and are being offered to people on Pembrokeshire county council’s housing register who have lived in the area for five years’.

So how many of these houses are for social housing, six or four?

Either way, Glen Peters has made a tidy wodge from the ‘Welsh’ Government and a factory paid for out of public funds has been added to his property portfolio. Yet his Linkedin profile boasts that he has been “Eco Entrepreneur of the Year”.

An entrepreneur (for which there is no word in Welsh, incidentally) is someone who takes risks with his own money. How the hell can anyone be an entrepreneur when he’s feather-bedded by the public purse?

The Solar Village website makes a big thing of “employing locals”, yet closer inspection reveals that these people are ‘local’ only in the sense that they’ve moved to Wales. Just like so many other schemes in the Welsh countryside, especially where environmentalism is concerned, we see Welsh public money funding social engineering.

As for Glanrhyd, it’s a hamlet on a B road some five kilometres from Cardigan. I’m not sure how good the public transport links are, but even if they’re good Ateb might have had trouble finding tenants. Seeing as the houses are now occupied I’d like to know who lives in them, how many are social tenants, and how local those people are to the area.

Worth asking because the Ateb Group is a curious beast, a Community Benefit Society that includes Mill Bay Homes Ltd. I don’t understand how a private company can shelter under the umbrella of a Community Benefit Society; but then, all sorts of things are permitted, or overlooked, in the strange world of Welsh housing associations.

For example, Mill Bay Homes is no longer a Registered Social Landlord, which is hardly surprising seeing as it builds and sells property on the open market like Wimpey and Redrow; but it has over the years borrowed millions from its publicly-funded parent company Pembrokeshire Housing which now – re-branded Ateb – is buying properties from Mill Bay!

It’s all very complicated. Deliberately so.

Does that bank of solar panels feed into the grid when demand is low? If so, who gets the money? Picture courtesy of WalesOnline. Click to enlarge

Western Solar Power has plans for more villages. Another project lined up is for Coastal Housing in sun-blest Ammanford. Where no doubt the public purse will further enrich Glen Peters and Coastal Housing will have properties that attract positive publicity in obscure publications, but they’ll be expensive to build and might not serve the purpose used to justify the public funding – affordable homes for local people.

Glen Peters is obviously on a good thing. All he has to do is keep pressing the right buttons and the money pours into his bank account. But I can’t help thinking that social housing could be delivered a lot cheaper, in places locals want to live, which is why I’m sceptical of Pentre Solar and similar projects.

Bottom line is, it might be acceptable for Glen Peters to enrich himself playing the enlightened squire, and employing his cronies – but not with our money!

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BERYL’S IN PERIL!

No doubt you’re all aware that there’s a by-election campaign under way in Cydweli’s Mynydd-y-Garreg ward. In fact, there are only two wards in Cydweli; Mynydd-y-Garreg and Castle, which might make life easy for some, but for your average punter, having eight or nine community councillors for his or her ward must cause confusion.

The council is Labour controlled, with a few Independents, one Tory, one Plaid Cymru, and Ukip represented by Gary Beer of Swansea Quality Lettings Ltd. (That has a certain ring to it, no?)

Standing for Labour in Mynydd-y-Garreg is Beryl-Ann Williams. I’m told her election literature is in English only, a great disappointment to see this on the home turf of the late Ray Gravell, where 62% of the working age population speaks Welsh . . . but only 21% of retired people. Now I wonder why that is?

Beryl-Ann works in the third sector as an ‘art psychotherapist’. (No, honestly, I did not just make that up.) This psychotherapisting may be done at the Kidwelly Community Hub, which seems to serve as a publicly-funded but unofficial Labour Party clubhouse.

Beryl-Ann Williams, Lee Waters AM on the left and Nia Griffith MP on the right, with mayor Phil Thompson behind the MP.

This being the Llanelli constituency, where Plaid Cymru has self-destructed, and Tories have never been thick on the ground, her sole opponent is Independent Ronald Carl Peters-Bond, whose literature is bilingual and has a powerful message:

“Kidwelly Town Council’s focus has been on building a new office costing over £500,000, the overspend on which has now left it in serious financial difficulties. We need to stop the rot.” and “Currently over 80% of the tax you pay to Kidwelly Town Council goes on administration and keeping that shiny building.”

Can you believe that a Labour administration would waste money on such things? And overspend?

I look forward to hearing from distant Cydweli that Grav’s old stomping-ground has rejected a Labour/third sector blagger who seems to have no love for Wales and her heritage.

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‘I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT IT . . . MUST BE SOMEBODY ELSE’S GOVERNMENT RESPONSIBLE’

Back in May I wrote about BikePark Wales, yet another example of Welsh assets being handed over to a bunch of strangers in order that they can enrich themselves. In this particular case it was Natural Resources Wales leasing a large area of forested land near Merthyr Tudful to a company with the absurd name of Beic Parcio Cymru Ltd operating as BikePark Wales.

Something that particularly worried me was the fact that this company felt it had the power to fine locals found on the land it was leasing, and that these fines could be collected on the spot by ‘marshalls’ (sic).

click to enlarge

A regular reader of this blog tried to get a number of politicians interested in this surely unacceptable behaviour; Labour and Plaid Cymru couldn’t be bothered and the only politician who came through was Mostyn Neil Hamilton, the Ukip AM for the Mid and West Wales Region.

Last week, in Plenary at the Assembly, Hamilton raised the issue with first minister Carwyn Jones, who professed complete ignorance. (Available here at 22:05.) Now put aside any antipathy you may have towards Ukip, or Hamilton, and consider the issue on its merits. And think about Carwyn Jones’ response.

In that irritating I’m-a-tidy-bloke-but-cleverer-than-you manner Carwyn Jones tried to laugh it off and almost seemed to suggest that Hamilton was making it up. But if what Jones said was right, then BikePark Wales is acting illegally. That being so, then surely something has now been done about it?

No. I’ve just checked the BikePark Wales website and it reads the same as it did before. Which suggests that Carwyn Jones and his management team really doesn’t care about such colonialist arrogance.

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When strangers take over a country, exploit it for their own ends, when the indigenous population is elbowed aside, and when a collaborationist administration encourages and funds such behaviour, then that, my friend, can not be dressed up as ‘investment’, or disguised as an ‘economic strategy’.

It is colonialism; and to deny it is no different to the Green Party (of England) refusing to accept that Wales is a country in its own right, just an economically underdeveloped region of England or Britain.

By any criteria you care to apply Wales is a colony. What are you going to do about it?

♦ end ♦

 

Snippets and Updates 19.04.2018

On By JacIn British Nationalism, Cardiff Bay, Colonisation of Wales, Conservative and Unionist Party, Corruption, English Nationalism, Housing, Housing Associations, Local Government, Media, Plaid Cymru, Public Funding, Swansea, Welsh Assembly, Welsh Government, Welsh Labour84 Comments

I’ve neglected you in recent weeks, relying on two excellent guest posts from Brychan Davies and Aled Gwyn Jôb. But now I’m back. With a vengeance!

Though this offering is long, over 3,000 words, it’s made up of six different items, so you can take them one at a time if you like.

Enjoy!

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THE BEAST FROM THE EAST

You may beware – then again, you might have better things to do – that there is currently an election under way for a deputy leader in the ‘Welsh’ Labour Party. The two candidates are Julie Morgan, widow of Rhodri, while in the other corner we see the MP for Swansea East, Carolyn Harris.

I am no longer au fait with how things are done in bruvverdom but as a reactionary I’m delighted to see old traditions maintained with local commissar for the trade union Unite, Andy Richards, deciding on their behalf that its members all supported Harris. Unfortunately for him, it turned out that quite a number of his members preferred Mrs Morgan. And they said so publicly, in a video supporting Mrs Morgan.

This infuriated Comrade Richards to such an extent that the revisionists were put on the slow train for Siberia suspended. But word came there from above over-ruling the local commissar, from the office of Unite supremo McCluskey, Friend of the People, Hero of the Revolution, recipient of the Order of Jeremy and countless other commendations.

And so it came to pass that the train was stopped at Severn Junction and the suspended officials escorted off to be reunited with their loved ones, and reinstated into the bruvverhood, Zils and dachas restored.

Courtesy of Wales Online, click to enlarge

During the festivities attending their restoration to the fold (held on the sunlit uplands), a friend of the previously suspended officials said: “I’m pleased the Unite team nationally have shown leadership on this issue, which unfortunately has been so lacking in Wales”.

So there you have it. It seems that in trade unions the old ways of doing things still obtain in the more backward oblasts. Thankfully, at ‘national’ level we find a leadership more attuned to the new-fangled Glasnost.

Even though she’s fighting for the Labour deputy leadership Harris has not neglected her long-standing vendetta against “dyke shoes”-wearing former colleague Jenny Lee Clarke, who will stand trial in June, in Newport, on the contrived charge of theft by the curious route of having paid herself too much.

This case has dragged on for over two years and taken its toll on Ms Lee, especially since South Wales Police told her at one stage the case was being dropped!

I don’t know about you, but thinking of the countless expenses scandals, I find it rather grotesque that an MP should accuse anyone of paying themselves too much. This could bring irony into disrepute.

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CYMDEITHAS CAER LAS

I know, I know . . . you’re thinking, “Who or what is Cymdeithas Caer Las?”, as well you might, because Caer Las is one of those organisations that prefers to keep a low profile. Explained by the fact that it’s in the business of running ‘hostels’ and in other ways housing those “suffering exclusion” – code for ex-cons and others that most people don’t want living anywhere near them.

Despite being based in the centre of Swansea Caer Las has always been very busy across the mighty torrent to the west. To the extent that a few years back people started calling Llanelli ‘Little Beirut‘ due to the problems caused by undesirables turning up in certain areas of the town. The worst affected areas seemed to around the railway station and down to Seaside, an area of small terraced houses, which of course are cheap to buy.

From the Caer Las website, click to enlarge

Here we find George Street where, after a fire last week, a body was found. The news media soon lost interest in the story but I got to wondering who might own the property, so I went to the Land Registry website. Sure enough, the house is owned by Cymdeithas Caer Las.

A third sector outfit that received over three million pounds last year, the great bulk of it from the ‘Welsh’ Government, and where roughly 70% of that income went on salaries. An organisation that, to keep the funding flowing, brings in clients from over the border.

The ‘Welsh’ third sector in microcosm.

I don’t know who the poor sod who died was, but he has my sympathy. The system will now go through its motions, an investigation will be followed by a quick inquest and perhaps a pauper’s grave.

There are plenty more where he came from to keep Caer Las and countless other third sector businesses thriving.

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WALES AND WEST HOUSING IN CEREDIGION

First the good news. Ceredigion planning committee refused the application by Wales and West Housing to build on the Ffynnonbedr school site in Lampeter. Given the problems ‘Welsh’ Labour’s favourite housing association has already caused in the town with its other properties it would have been perverse of the councillors to have allowed this anti-social housing scheme.

But as is so often the case, planning officers wanted to rush ahead, citing a (non-existent) local demand for one-bed flats. Over years of studying local government it’s become clear to me that too many senior officers in our local authorities are strangers to Wales and unsympathetic to Welsh priorities. This is a problem that must be remedied with the next local government reorganisation.

Though in this case the officer involved, Keith Davies, is Welsh, but seems to operate as an employee of Wales and West rather than Cyngor Ceredigion. Maybe it comes down to politics.

Moving up the A487 to Aberystwyth there is more news on the Plas Morolwg site above the harbour, a project you read about not so long ago in Who Needs Democracy? and Wales and West Housing, the scandal continues.

You’ll recall that the local branch of the Labour Party, now controlled by a Momentum crowd, none of whom seems to have been born anywhere near Ceredigion, took advantage of the closure of the Bodlondeb special needs home in the town to attack the Plaid-led council.

The result was that the council was pushed into the arms of Wales and West, who promised to replace Bodlondeb with a new development on the Plas Morolwg site. The understanding being that the new Plas Morolwg facility would provide a dementia unit to replace the one lost at Bodlondeb.

But I learn there will be no dementia wing at Plas Morolwg. The new development looks increasingly like a purely commercial venture, perhaps like the Pobl Group’s Cwm Aur retirement flats near Llanybydder, which were advertised on Right Move. (So obviously no local connection required.)

And let’s not forget that we’re talking big bucks here. A similar extra care scheme opened by Wales and West last year in Newtown, Powys received a £4m Social Housing Grant from the ‘Welsh’ Government. Though note that the caption below also tells us, “Wales and West funded the remainder with £3.5m”. Wasn’t that generous of them?

Courtesy of Wales and West Housing, click to enlarge

No, not really. Not when we remember that everything housing associations own today has been given to them. From the housing stock they took over from councils and other bodies to the never-ending grants; yet they behave – and expect to be treated! – as if they’re independent and self-supporting businesses!

And with housing associations building retirement homes and other facilities it reminds us that it’s not just the social housing role that they’ve usurped from local councils. But are they qualified to run care facilities? In the case of the Newtown scheme care is provided by Wales and West’s very own Castell Care and Support which comes under the umbrella of Castell Ventures.

Housing associations and other third sector bodies are increasingly taking over the running of Wales. They own property paid for from the public purse, they receive vast sums every year from the ‘Welsh’ Government, yet unlike local authorities there is no democratic accountability. We can’t even submit a Freedom of Information request because they’re exempt from FoI legislation.

But sod that, all that matters is that they’re accountable to the Labour Party and stuffed with Labour cronies.

Before ending this section let’s just return to Plas Morolwg for a minute. And talking of money, let’s remember that Wales and West got a Social Housing Grant of £1.6m to buy the site – which it already owned! Though according to council leader Ellen ap Gwynn the money is being given for “enabling works”, whatever the hell that means.

Though to judge by reactions from her and council officers when a councillor raised the issue at a cabinet meeting the £1.6m is probably supposed to be a secret.

Now that Labour’s Wales and West Housing has reneged on providing dementia care at Plas Morolwg I predict that the local Momentum crowd led by wannabe politician Dinah Mulholland will take to the streets again to attack the council for letting down vulnerable people.

Perhaps Owen Jones will pay another visit. (Maybe I’ll get him in a selfie! Or a head-lock!)

UPDATE: Right on cue, to increase my worries about housing associations taking on roles for which they are not suited, an article appeared in Llais y Sais today, written by Jas Bains, chief executive of Hafod. Jas has been in Wales for almost a year, so he knows exactly what Wales needs.

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Jas writes, “Our plan is to take this a step further, using this opportunity of transformational change to fully integrate housing provision into the new health and care models, based on neighbourhoods and communities”.

But where is the political or legal authority for unaccountable bodies entrusted with the provision of social housing to take over social care and health provision? Where is the expertise? Does ‘Welsh’ Labour plan to use its housing associations to retain power in a country where its moral authority is ebbing away?

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WALES FOR A UNITED KINGDOM

Someone contacted me anonymously last week suggesting that Wales for a United Kingdom may be run by a couple of men who own an online gift business with an address in Brecon’s West End. I was unable to establish a firm connection, so if you have any further information please get back in touch.

As might be expected, I made a few enquiries. First off, the Twitter account – from which I’m blocked! Can you believe that? (I can only assume they’ve got me mixed up with some other Jac o’ the North.) There’s an easy way around being blocked, so I went through the timeline.

Here’s an example of what I found.

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All in all, it’s rather a sad little site, almost patronising; promoting a ‘Cute little Wales’ kind of Welshness that suggests those behind it aren’t Welsh at all. It should also go without saying that those behind Wales for a United Kingdom are opposed to devolution, perhaps because they think the natives aren’t ready to run their own affairs. Such things being best left to the Great White Mother and her people.

It’s also a site to which the military – especially the RAF – seems to be very important. What is it with these BritNats; their ‘Britishness’, their patriotism, seems to be fixated on the military and the monarchy? It’s all about belting out GSTQ and then giving Johnny Foreigner a damn good kicking.

I look forward to seeing England football fans trying that behaviour in Russia this summer during the World Cup.

Do the English have nothing else to be proud of? Or do BritNats suffer from an imperial hangover? A question worth asking because there seem to be quite a few of them about, so be on your guard, and report any sightings to Jac.

UPDATE: My source came back to confirm that the person behind Wales for a United Kingdom is Adam Jon Brown of Brecon. He and his partner Raymond Michael Parkinson started Bluebellsgifts Ltd last August.

Coincidentally, Brown’s identity was confirmed by another source via Facebook who added that Adam Jon Brown might work for Kentucky Fried Chicken. He certainly had worked for the Colonel in the recent past.

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CHARLES WINDSOR

Unless you’ve been stuck somewhere for a few weeks without contact with the outside world you’ll know about Secretary of State for Wales Alun Cairns’ plan to name the Second Severn Crossing the Prince of Wales Bridge. At the time of writing, the petition opposing this odious piece of arse-licking had passed 37,000 signatures.

It was bad enough, if predictable, that the suggestion should come from a Conservative politician, but the dire state of this nation was further exposed when we learnt that the ‘Welsh’ Government had been consulted, and either agreed that it was a splendid idea or just went along with it.

Predictably, a BritNat twat writing for an English newspaper waded in to the hitherto internal debate. The twat in question being Rod Liddle of the Sunday Times. Complaints were made to IPSO, the so-called ‘press watchdog’, but because we Welsh don’t kill people, plant bombs, or riot, it was rejected.

Perhaps emboldened by the current ‘Let’s put the buggers in their place’ campaign, that began its recent cycle with the Flint Ring of Steel, some silly sod then suggested that what Wales really needs is not jobs, or a decent health service, or a better transport infrastructure, but a royal palace. (C’mon, be honest, after a few jars you’ve often thought the same thing.)

The ‘Welsh’ media duly reported it in the forensic manner we have come to expect, “Wales would benefit by creating a royal palace” reads the headline in the article by Martin Shipton, focusing on the vague suggestion that such a palace might generate tourism income, and the great man himself listed the benefits with bullet points.

The real reason, and the true thinking behind it, was blatantly political, and equally blatantly BritNat.

click to enlarge

We have to push on to the halfway point to read: “In an era when the UK appears to be becoming increasingly fragmented, it (the proposed palace) could act as a focus by binding the Welsh nation into the union with the other nations in the British Isles”.

Stripped of all the bollocks about economic benefits, and international recognition, this is just another piece of very unsubtle BritNat poking, to see if we’re still awake, and reacting. Let’s confirm that we’re awake and alert by telling anyone supporting this idea to fuck right off.

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THE 2017 ELECTION IN GOWER

For those unfamiliar with the locale, Gower is the third Swansea constituency, taking in Mumbles, the peninsula that gives the constituency its name, and then running north to the former industrial towns on the city’s western and northern peripheries such as Gowerton and Gorseinon.

Until the May 2015 general election Gower had always returned a Labour MP, but then the unthinkable happened, Port Eynon-born former Met police officer, Swansea councillor and then AM, Byron Davies won the seat by just 27 votes. This was not well received by the bruvvers, and plans were hatched to regain the seat, by hook or by crook.

click to enlarge

The campaign in Gower was febrile, with Labour shipping canvassers in from England to its number one target seat. We also saw the darker side of Labour behaviour with an orchestrated and coordinated campaign of lies against the sitting MP, even death threats. Now those responsible are being identified.

On Tuesday an apology was issued on Twitter by Dan Evans. He “also made a substantial contribution to a charity chosen by the former MP“. So who is Dan Evans?

His Linkedin profile tells us that he’s a ‘freelance filmmaker’ (sic), while also being a youth and community worker at the Red Cafe in Mumbles, and he’s also involved with the Down to Earth project. To judge from the photographs provided, these enterprises don’t do much for the indigenous population. Typical third sector.

Evans’ earlier employment suggests happy-clappy do-gooding.

Now I don’t wish to be unkind, but one thing that pisses me off with socialists, especially those with pretensions to intellectual status, is their air of moral and intellectual superiority. I’m talking now about the looking-down-the-nose attitude which dismisses anyone who disagrees with them as both stupid and evil.

This imagined superiority, coupled with delusions of being on some kind of crusade (a word used surprisingly often by Labour politicians), convinces many of those I’m describing that any tactics are justifiable.

But when these secular sentiments of superiority are intermingled with religious fervour in the service of Labour we reach unprecedented heights of self-righteous certainty, and this is where we find the likes of Dan Evans.

But he was not alone. Byron Davies says he has a list of six people guilty of slandering him, and even spreading unfounded rumours about his wife.

I’m told that a centre for this dirty campaign was Penclawdd rugby club. Some might think this an unlikely setting for such skulduggery, but Tonia Antoniazzi was an international rugby player. I’m also told that in the clubhouse may be found some of the most vicious and vindictive Labour types, one guy in particular.

But what should happen now?

As Theresa May said in parliament yesterday, Byron Davies lost his seat due to a social media campaign of lies waged against him by Labour Party supporters. More specifically, supporters of Jeremy Corbyn. In other words, the same evil schemers of Momentum we met earlier in Ceredigion.

I believe that Tonia Antoniazzi should stand down and there should be a by-election in Gower. But she won’t do that. A woman who couldn’t get elected onto her local town council a few years back, and only became an MP last year thanks to the most evil campaign seen in Wales for many years, will not risk losing her cushy number with a fair election.

And what of Dan Evans? Given that he does a lot of work for the Labour Party will they tell him there’ll be no work in future? And on the assumption he’s also a member, will he be expelled from the party?

click to enlarge

Then there’s the question of whether the campaign was organised on a purely local level by people like Dan Evans or whether it was run from higher up the Labour food chain. For as I’ve said, this was Labour’s number one target seat in 2017, not just in Wales, but across the island.

Will the Labour Party now investigate whether any other of its members and supporters was involved in the campaign against Byron Davies? If it wasn’t done by the Labour Party (as we like to think of it), then there must be a very good chance of it having been organised within the ranks of Momentum.

Either way it is becoming clearer by the day that despite the self-delusional images of crusades, its members’ laughable belief in moral and intellectual superiority, the Labour Party is morally bankrupt and intellectually corrupt.

The Labour Party today represents nothing but itself. It clings to power for no better reason than that power provides a whole structure of patronage through which it can control Welsh public life and then use that control to hang on to power.

And because this is how Labour operates the party attracts people seeking personal advancement, who could just as easily join Zanu-PF if that lot was running Wales. When you have these in the same party as the intellectually and morally pretentious then you have a Hyde and Hyde party.

Because just like some monster from a horror movie ‘Welsh’ Labour corrupts everything it comes into contact with. So there must be no more compromises or co-operation; when confronted with evil like this there can only be one response. The Labour Party must be destroyed.

For the good of Wales.

♦ end ♦

 

 

Third Sector Bollocks

On By JacIn Cardiff Bay, Colonisation of Wales, Common Purpose, Corruption, Englandandwales, Housing Associations, Labour Party, Media, Public Funding, Social Cleansing, Social Housing, Third Sector, Welsh Assembly, Welsh Government, Welsh Labour, Welsh Media100 Comments

UNCRITICAL PUBLICITY

Over recent years, at the prompting of political friends of the homelessness industry, both BBC Wales and the print media have given television series and pages of newsprint so that the countless competing and duplicating businesses in the sector can promote themselves and their ‘mission’.

To my knowledge, nothing even vaguely critical of the homelessness racket has been allowed. It’s the sort of publicity other commercial enterprises usually have to pay for.

But this free publicity is not restricted to companies in the homelessness business, it covers all bodies operating in the third sector, to the extent that the third sector has achieved the status of royalty or dead heroes in that it’s beyond criticism.

If nothing else, this exposes yet again the problems caused to Wales and Welsh public life by the incestuous little world we know as the Cardiff Bay Bubble.

We saw it with the death of Carl Sargeant and we see it again in the crucifixion of Neil McEvoy. A politician’s political or personal enemies ask a lobbying outfit to get some friend in the third sector to make a silly claim of harassment, or bullying, or bum-touching.

The victimisation process might even be initiated by the lobbyists themselves. (‘Shame on you!’ I hear.)

Then it’s a case of all girls together and another poor man-beast is brought down.

Another part of the Bay Bubble is the ‘Welsh’ media, which cannot criticise the third sector, stuffed with Labour Party members and supporters, without offending the Labour Party itself. So the third sector gets the kind of kid-glove treatment I’ve just described.

So who loses out? You and me, my friend, and the 99.9% of Wales lying outside of the Cardiff Bay Bubble.

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WCVA STEPS IN WITH DIRE WARNINGS

Earlier this month the Wasting Mule ran a big publicity puff and funding appeal (masquerading as a news story) for the Wales Council for Voluntary Action, in which CEO Ruth Marks told us that the “voluntary sector” is worth £1bn but she’s worried about reducing funding. Note the use of the term “voluntary sector”.

click to enlarge, or click here to view as a pdf document

Ms Marks quoted spurious figures which I’ve highlighted. For example, the figure she uses for ‘England’ almost certainly includes UK-wide bodies based in England and even international agencies such as Oxfam and Save the Children.

The only valid comparison would be England-only agencies with Wales-only agencies. Because I know damn well that in England a Tory Government, and Tory-controlled local authorities, do not throw money at the third sector in the manner of Welsh socialist politicians maintaining their system of patronage.

This reluctance to fund the third sector in England explains why so many third sector operatives have flocked to Wales since we’ve had devolution and Labour dishing out the loot.

Another interesting claim is that the third sector accounts for 10% of Welsh employment. Seeing as these jobs are almost entirely reliant on public funding they could be equated to paying benefit. Or, to be more generous, seeing as many third sector activities are ‘outsourced’ transferring from the public sector to the third sector just re-labels existing jobs.

Then again, the “voluntary sector” means unpaid work, so how can it account for 10% of Welsh employment? She must be confused, or perhaps hoping to confuse us.

After studying the third sector in Wales for many years I know there is a deliberate attempt to mislead or deceive in almost everything the third sector says and does. That’s because there’s a lot of money involved and many careers; the third sector is often a stepping stone to a political career, or it provides a nice retirement job after leaving politics.

But to enjoy these benefits you must be in the ‘club’. And membership is restricted to the Labour Party, with Plaid Cymru – in return for political support – allowed to feed off the scraps.

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WCVA GETS REALLY DIRE

Just nine days after the Ruth Marks piece in Llais y Sais, the WCVA was back with a full-page article written by Anna Nicholl, Director of Strategy and Sector Development.

click to enlarge, or click here to view as a pdf document

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing like grabbing the reader’s attention with the first few lines, just think of: “Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again”, or “All happy families are alike, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”, and of course, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife”.

But when I read, “To my mind, the very fabric of Welsh life depends on the survival of the third sector”, the needle on the old hypocrisy meter went off the dial. While the bollocks detection equipment just blew up from some kind of power surge. (You should have seen the cat move!)

Hypocrisy_meter_tsd

To believe Anna Nicholl, the third sector is all that saves our beloved homeland from the ravages of the Four Horsemen.

Whereas the truth is that many Welsh communities are being damaged by the criminals, addicts, problem families and others imported by many third sector bodies (and here I include housing associations). Because once you’ve found your racket, and got your funding, you need a steady supply of ‘clients’ to keep the funding flowing, and if Wales can’t provide enough ‘clients’ then you have to look elsewhere.

Earlier I wrote, “there is a deliberate attempt to mislead or deceive in almost everything the third sector says and does”. This article by Anna Nicholl proves my point. But for anyone in doubt, let me spell it out.

On the one hand we have the kind of third sector body represented by the WCVA, such as homelessness company Llamau, with its 266 employees, spending over 70% of its £10m+ annual income on salaries, and paying its CEO £80,000+. Llamau is obviously not a voluntary organisation – it is a business.

Worst of all, it is a publicly-funded business competing with too many other, publicly-funded businesses.

By comparison, Mrs Williams (Troedyrhiw) who you encounter on the High Street, and who puts a sticky badge on your chest for dropping a washer or two in her tin (I always carry some), is a volunteer, because she performs this work for nothing.

Which is not to say that the organisation Mrs Williams collects for doesn’t have paid officials higher up its food chain, but these are charities in that they rely on donations from the public – not government funding.

Another kind of voluntary group is that we see in the picture used to illustrate the Anna Nicholl article, a local group trying to improve its neighbourhood, and with groups such as this there is usually no money involved at all!

So why use a picture like that if it’s not an attempt to mislead or deceive those reading the article?

In fact, Ms Nicholl gives the game away with the wording of the caption accompanying her photo: ” . . . the vital third sector, such as voluntary organisations”. But ‘voluntary organisations’ are only a small part of the third sector, and here they’re being used as a fig leaf.

The good news might be that the WCVA realises that the kind of organisations I criticise are now beyond defending, the only hope being to confuse them in the public mind with ‘voluntary organisations’.

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AN ATTEMPT AT BALANCE

After reading Anna Nicholl’s deliberate confusion or conflation of voluntary groups with the avaricious money-grabbers the WCVA really represents I was moved to write to the Western Mail. So I sent my e-mail and got a quick response asking for my full address.

So we know they have my letter for publication, will they now have the balls to publish it, unedited? Just in case, here it is.

“It seems that in recent weeks the third sector has felt the need to defend itself. Presumably in an effort to help, the Western Mail ran a big piece on the 8th quoting Ruth Marks, Wales Council for Voluntary Action CEO; and then on the 16th we had a full-page article by Anna Nicholl, Director of Strategy and Sector Development at the WCVA.
 
This later article was accompanied by a big picture of a mother and child picking up litter, as an example of the ‘voluntary groups’ the WCVA claims to represent, and on which “Welsh life depends”, according to Ms Nicholl. The picture was cute, but deliberately misleading.
 
I have criticised the third sector over many years, principally on my blog, ‘Jac o’ the North’, but I have never criticised voluntary groups, nor charities with an obvious purpose such as the RNLI. My criticism has been reserved for what can only be described as self-serving, third sector businesses.
 
Many of which get millions of pounds in public funding every year, with most of the money going in salaries. And a hefty chunk of that salary funding going to the CEO, who is invariably a Labour Party member or supporter, and often from outside of Wales.
 
As if that isn’t bad enough, we have the duplication to consider. In a recent FoI response from the ‘Welsh’ Government I was told that there are 48 bodies in Wales dealing with homelessness. That’s forty-eight in a country of 3 million people.
 
Having identified an ‘issue’ to exploit it then becomes imperative for third sector bodies to have a steady supply of ‘clients’ in order to ensure the continuation of the generous funding. To meet this need often means importing undesirables from outside of Wales.
 
One Cardiff-based housing association is currently wreaking havoc in Lampeter with the drug dealers and others it’s housing in that hitherto peaceful town – and it has applied to Ceredigion council for permission to convert more buildings to one-bed flats in order to bring in more misfits! And remember – this is being paid for from the Welsh public purse!
 
How can we explain this apparent idiocy? The answer lies in the fact that the third sector is, as I’ve suggested, an extension of the Labour Party.
 
On one level, the third sector is pure cronyism in that it provides thousands of jobs for Labour supporters. On another level, the size of the third sector is used to indicate how poor Wales is, and of course it’s always someone else’s fault – so ‘Vote Labour!’
 
Which means that the third sector exploits and entrenches Wales’ poverty for the benefit of those working in it and for the electoral advantage of the Labour Party.
 
If the hundreds of millions of pounds poured into the third sector every year was used to encourage entrepreneurship and invite investment Wales would be much better off, but would also be less likely to vote Labour.
 
All of which means that the unnecessary, crony-filled and duplicating third sector bodies I’m dealing with have nothing in common whatsoever with mothers and children picking up litter in their local park.”

♦ end ♦

UPDATE 20.03.2018: Chwarae teg, the WM published the letter in full today.

Networks

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Englandandwales, Housing Associations, Local Government, Plaid Cymru, Public Funding, Third Sector, Welsh Government, Welsh Labour28 Comments

‘DO YOU WANNA BE IN MY GANG?’

We all belong to some kind of network. It can be as obvious as family or friends, or else it’s neighbours, workmates, political associates, other fans of the teams you support, fellow-worshippers at your chapel or church, even the people you play darts with down the pub. And nowadays we have to include social media.

Yet when we consciously use the word I’m sure many of us think of vaguely sinister organisations such as the Freemasons.

A curious outfit, the Freemasons, forever extolling their links with the Temple of Solomon, the Knights Templar, and the intellectuals and freethinkers of the Renaissance and the French Enlightenment. Yet this brotherhood lost its way and became what we see today – a mutual benefit society.

In fact, the Masons changed from being an organisation of questioning intellectuals to one representing an unquestioning and defensive bourgeoisie linked with the Conservative and Unionist Party, and in Ireland with Unionism and the Orange Order.

Freemasonry became a buttress for a UK establishment feeling threatened by the extending franchise in Britain and ‘Fenianism’ in Ireland. Which is not to say that supporters of other political parties don’t become Masons, but at root, Freemasonry is very much a Queen and Country organisation.

Yet today’s Freemasons maintain the pretence they belong to a rebellious intellectual continuum taking in Michaelangelo and Voltaire. Obvious nonsense.

One of the great bogeymen, and therefore recruiting sergeants, for the Freemasons a century ago was the Labour Party. Labour returned the compliment by trying to copy the reach of Freemasonry by building up its own network.

As with Freemasonry when it moved beyond the esoteric Labour’s expanding network of affiliated and associated bodies attracted individuals seeking personal advancement. This has predictably resulted in corruption.

Nowhere is this corruption more obvious now than in Wales.

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THE OLIVE TRUST & THE KIDWELLY HUB

In the previous post we renewed our acquaintance with Denise Kingsley Acton, former Green Party candidate in Watford, proprietrix of the Olive Trust (‘Smells ‘n’ chants ‘r’ us’) who washed up in Wales (as so many like her do), struck up a curious friendship with an elderly Swansea Labour councillor, and then in 2010 applied for £1,000,000 from the Welsh European Funding Office.

click to enlarge

Last week I wrote to WEFO asking if this application had been successful. The answer I received seems very carefully worded. The underlinings are mine.

“Thanks for your email. I’ve discussed with colleagues and as far as we’re aware, the Olive Trust does not appear to have directly received EU funding. For your information, the EU funds pages of the Welsh Government shows a list of all approved project through the current programmes“.

“As far as we’re aware” be buggered! Surely they keep records, they must know!

On the assumption that she did not get her million it could be that Denise Kingsley Acton believes the grass – and perhaps the funders – may be greener in Carmarthenshire, for she is now domiciled in Kidwelly. To be exact, in a detached house on an expensive new development near Mynydd-y-Garreg.

According to 192.com Denise S Kingsley lives with the man to whom I assume she is engaged – for her Facebook page informs us she is betrothed – and a Denise S Acton! Ménage à trois? Of course not – how dare you! – but confusion is bound to result when you use different names; and when she gets married the confusion can only increase.

Kingsley-Acton has recently opined that Kidwelly is badly in need of a community building (the kind of thing she wanted a million quid for in 2010) but hasn’t she heard of ‘The Hub’? It’s all happening in the Kidwelly Community Hub . . . well, maybe not much is happening, but it provides photo opportunities galore for Labour politicians. So it serves its real purpose.

Nia Griffith MP (in paper hat), Cllr Phil Thompson (green pinnie), Barry Lee Waters AM (back row), click to enlarge

The curious thing about the Hub, or to give it its proper name, Ynghyd Community Interest Company is that the Companies House website tells us there are three people with the “Right to appoint and remove directors“ – Mrs Nicola Herbertson of Surbiton, Mrs Diana Sylvia Groom, now of Kidwelly but until very recently a psychotherapist in Oxfordshire, and a Mr Steve Jones.

Other directors or former directors are also recent arrivals in Wales. Which makes the claim on the Facebook page that “Kidwelly Community Hub is a venture by Kidwelly people for Kidwelly people” a load of old bollocks, as we students of the third sector are wont to say.

It’s all so reminiscent of another ‘community’ venture in Carmarthenshire, this one at Llandovery. There we find another Englishwoman, Jill Tatman, who has commandeered a building – the former YMCA – then demanded and received funding to pay herself a good salary for running the show, though the YMCA has told her she can no longer use their name.

That’s because there are suspicions that hubby’s interest in the children visiting the building is not entirely innocent. Though she is said to have defended him at a recent trustees meeting by arguing that he had suffered enough for “only rubbing up against the kids”. So that’s all right then.

How many of these fucking memsahibs are there infesting our rural areas? Though some of them are not even living here, they seem to do it by remote control!

Firmly in Kidwelly, we find town and former county councillor Phil Thompson. Thompson is a barrister at law, yet his Declaration of Interests tells us he lives in social housing provided by Pobl (formerly Gwalia). Can’t a lawyer afford to buy a place of his own?

It reminds me of someone else with a very healthy income who lives in social housing, someone who writes regular letters to Llais y Sais. But then, former RAF Group Captain Kel Palmer of Mountain Ash is another Labour Party supporter, formerly involved with the doomed Communities First programme.

Many assume that social housing is for local people who can’t afford to buy a home of their own, which is how it should be, but not how it works in Wales. Well-off people can get social housing – if they’re in the Labour Party.

But then, the social housing system fails Wales in so many ways.

Not far from where Phil Thompson lives in Kidwelly his landlord Gwalia housed a gang of paedophiles brought down from London. Housing associations are bringing untold misery to Welsh communities by importing all manner of criminals, such as we see with Labour-controlled Wales and West in Lampeter.

To the point where what we have in Wales is very often anti-social housing – paid for from the Welsh public purse. How stupid must we be to tolerate this?

UPDATE 15.03.2018: I have now figured out how Mrs Nicola Herbertson of Surbiton got involved with the Kidwelly Hub. A previous director was Jonathan Michael Hobden, along with his wife, Fiona Mary. Here’s his Companies House entry and below is an extract from his Linkedin profile.

You’ll note, first, that he describes himself as a philanthropist! But more importantly, he is Director of Marketing at Hao2.eu aka 3DNovations. Now the CEO and founder of Hao2.eu Ltd is Nicola Herbertson. (There is also a Hao2.eu Foundation registered with the Charity Commission, No 1153397.)

So it would appear that Ynghyd Ltd / Kidwelly Hub is a creation of, and controlled by, a company based in London. Which reminds us yet again what a load of old bollocks is the claim on the Facebook page that,  Kidwelly Community Hub is a venture by Kidwelly people for Kidwelly people”. I doubt if there’s one genuine Kidwelly local involved.

So does the Kidwelly Hub exist for the people of Kidwelly or for the benefit of Hao2.eu and ‘Welsh’ Labour?

◊

K SHARP

Another recent arrival in the area is a company called K Sharp Ltd, and once again we should thank Llanelli Online for bringing us the news.

According to the story, attributed to Iwan Lewis, “K Sharp has spread its footprint by opening a new office in Llanelli, South Wales, whilst keeping an office in Gloucester”. This is clearly a regurgitated press release, for readers of Llanelli Online should not need to be told that their town is in south Wales. (Many would prefer ‘west Wales’.)

Though if we go to the Companies House entry for K Sharp Ltd we see that on 11 January the company changed its address to Suite 2, West End Yard, West End, Llanelli, which suggests a complete move rather than opening a branch office.

click to enlarge

So what do we know about K Sharp Ltd?

Well, the website suggests it’s a company concerned with human behaviour, including, ‘Cultural and Behavioural Analytics’, and that the head honcho is Barry Kirby, assisted by his wife and two other women. Much of their work seems to be police- or defence-related.

click to enlarge

So who is Barry?

Until quite recently Barry was Deputy Leader of the Labour group on Gloucestershire County Council, and a general election candidate to boot, until he threw it in last October. This rupture with the Gloucestershire Labour Party and the move to Llanelli in January (or earlier) are surely connected.

So why was Llanelli Online so late with the news?

Given K Sharp’s line of work is there any link with the Local MP, Nia Griffith, being shadow defence secretary? Or is Barry hoping to cash in on the Coffin partnership’s Wellness extravaganza?

I think we should be told why a company based in Gloucestershire, working with Gloucester University, suddenly ups sticks and moves 110 miles down the M4. Nobody makes a move like this unless there’s some advantage in it for them, so what has K Sharp Ltd been promised, and by whom?

Another mystery is that the Micro-entity accounts available on the Companies House website for K Sharp Ltd deal in peanuts, so where’s the money to run a company like this and pay four people’s salaries?

Looking at the bigger picture, is Labour perhaps fearful of electoral trends elsewhere in the county infecting Sosban and now attempting to strengthen its hold on the constituency? A project greatly helped by Plaid Cymru destroying itself in the area.

But with all the memsahibs, snake oil salesmen/saleswomen, and outright crooks now sucking on the teat of public funding, and with so few of them having true local connections, this ploy could backfire. Because people aren’t that stupid, not even lifelong Labour voters.

But whatever the future holds we can rely on Llanelli Online to bring us all the Labour Party news. It’ll be up to people like me to give you something closer to the truth.

 ♦ end ♦

 

Wales and West Housing, the scandal continues

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Housing Associations, Planning, Third Sector, Welsh Government, Welsh Labour93 Comments

INTRODUCTION

In the previous post ‘Sister Sledge’ and I tried, in our different ways, to explain the Labour Party’s links with various other bodies, from Spartist rent-a-mob-with-whistles outfits to superficially respectable social housing bodies.

Ultimately, such linkages combine to create a system not unlike those we see in one-party states, where the reach of the ruling party extends into every area of national life. Such contempt for plurality ignores the fact that Labour gets just a third of the votes in Assembly elections and it leads, as in true dictatorships, to over-confidence and even corruption.

Which might explain what I’m now going to tell you. Though if someone can satisfactorily prove to me that it’s nothing more than a genuine mistake then I shall make that clear in a subsequent post.

◊

PLAS MOROLWG

To give you the fullest understanding of the subject I think some background information would be helpful.

Plas Morolwg was a general needs family scheme owned by Bromford Carinthia, an English housing association, and built in the late 1970s. You have to wonder who gave planning permission for an English outfit to ship in dozens of people many of whom would have had special needs, with each one adding to the burden on the local health and other services.

But the importation of England’s problems still goes on, the difference today is that it’s done by ‘Welsh’ organisations using Welsh public money! Yet I have heard of no residential homes or social housing developments in England catering for Welsh people and paid for from English funds. Isn’t that strange?

Tai Cantref, based in Newcastle Emlyn, was pressured into buying Plas Morolwg by Tai Cymru, the former umbrella organisation for registered social landlords, now superseded by Community Housing Cymru. It was not a good buy.

To begin with, Plas Morolwg stood in an exposed location above the harbour/marina in Aberystwyth. It’s a nice spot when the sun’s out but otherwise at the mercy of the weather coming in off Cardigan Bay. Enough of a problem in itself, but Plas Morolwg was not very well built either, and a storm in February 2014 exposed just how bad a job the builders had done.

Almost before the wind had died down Tai Cantref slapped in a planning application on 11 February 2014 to demolish Plas Morolwg and replace it with a “mixed affordable and open market residential re-development”. (Ref No A140117.)

From @alanhalephoto, click to enlarge

As you’ve seen in the link supplied above, Outline Planning Permission was granted 7 October 2014 and Plas Morolwg was demolished in January 2015.

But more storm clouds were gathering. For some bad business decisions by Tai Cantref encouraged Bay Bubble scheming that saw this housing association brought to its knees and handed over to the Labour Party’s favourite RSL, Wales and West Housing.

This arranged marriage was formalised in September 2016. Which meant of course that Wales and West came into full possession of the now-cleared and ready-to-build-on Plas Morolwg site.

In addition to the Tai Cantref planning application to demolish and rebuild Plas Morolwg Wales and West has submitted a further application – Ref No A170922 – for a further eight “residential apartments”. (Are there non-residential apartments?)

This presumably is in addition to the Tai Cantref application of February 2014 for 64 apartments. The original Plas Morolwg complex was just 44 apartments, but the new building is two storeys higher and many believe it’s an even bigger eyesore than the original.

One thing’s for sure, the biddies on the top floor are in for exciting times when 90mph westerlies blow in from Labrador.

The next development in this saga was Ceredigion council announcing that the Bodlondeb extra care facility in Aberystwyth faced closure. This news was exploited by the Labour Party and its formed-for-the-purpose front organisation the Ceredigion People’s Assembly. (Not to be confused with the People’s Assembly of Ceredigion, or the Popular Assembly of Ceredigion.)

In response to the campaign the council entered into talks with Wales and West in the summer of 2017 for an extra care residential facility on the Plas Morolwg site to partly replace Bodlondeb.

So a Labour-led campaign against Ceredigion’s non-Labour council eventually drove the council into the arms of the Labour-run Wales and West Housing, which may now be in a position to demand whatever it wants on the Plas Morolwg site.

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LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

I have been helped with this section by someone who has signed up to the new party, someone with connections in Ceredigion Council and Cantref, and this individual has some very interesting information about the Council’s final quarter Social Housing Grant programme bid to the ‘Welsh’ Government.

Submitted by Keith Davies, on 16th February 2018, I am informed that the bid spreadsheet includes the following statement: “We have included a drawdown request for the Plas Morolwg extra care scheme acquisition stage totalling £1,690,000 . . . ”

The spreadsheet shows £1,051,000 being claimed for site acquisition of Plas Morolwg in the 2017/18 Social Housing Grant development programme; with an extra £188,500 claimed from any spare moolah available in 2017/18 surplus grant round to top up the “remaining acquisition grant only”.

This seems to suggest that Wales and West is to be paid Social Housing Grant to buy a development site that they acquired when the ‘Welsh’ Government encouraged them to take over Tai Cantref. In other words, a site they already own!

But just to be sure, I went to the Land Registry website. From there I downloaded both the title and the map of the site. There seems to be little question that Wales and West owns the Plas Morolwg site and with no money owing to banks or other lenders.

But then I got to thinking, ‘Well, hang on, maybe Wales and West is buying some extra land, and that explains this “acquisition stage” payment?’ So I went to the plan on the Ceredigion Council website, the plan relating to the proposed redevelopment of the site, and compared it with the Land Registry map.

click to enlarge

They’re identical. As you can see for yourself.

The proposed development moves down the hill to minimise the impact of the two extra storeys and this will almost certainly mean that access, parking and just about everything else will be located at the rear of the building.

◊

‘THE WILD WEST SHOW’

In the days when Ceredigion council was run by men of property, planning permission was so easy to come by, and planning rules treated with such contempt, that Paul Flynn, the veteran Newport West MP, described Ceredigion council as “the Wild West Show”.

Those days of greedy landowners enriching themselves may be gone, but a new menace to open and honest local government in Ceredigion has emerged in the form of Momentum, whose followers act as foot-soldiers for a locally unelectable Labour Party and its linked organisations.

This was all explained in my previous post.

Juvenile leftists with nothing better to do are one thing, but with Wales and West Housing we are dealing with a ruthless – possibly corrupt – organisation bent on hoovering up rivals thanks to funding and political support provided by its parent body, ‘Welsh’ Labour.

So we need answers to the following questions, and these answers must come from Wales and West itself, Cyngor Ceredigion, and the ‘Welsh’ Labour Government.

First, has the Plas Morolwg development received full planning approval? Then, given the history of the site, where will the residents come from?

But perhaps most important of all – is Wales and West Housing receiving £1.69m to buy a site it already owns? If so, why? And who authorised this funding?

The time has come for opposition politicians in the Assembly to demand an investigation into social housing in Wales; we must know exactly how it’s funded, whether it meets – even exceeds – the needs of Wales, and the relationship between some housing associations – particularly Wales and West Housing – and ‘Welsh’ Labour.

♦ end ♦

UPDATE 01.03.2018: Someone sent me a ‘Welsh’ Government document called a (social housing) Programme Delivery Plan for Ceredigion. I’m not sure how readable it is, but anyway, here’s the link.

The first page lists a number of projects in the pipeline, including Plas Morolwg, but with some information redacted. The other project with information redacted is Mid Wales Housing’s Cylch Caron in Tregaron, which I understand has been scuppered by Cyngor Ceredigion getting into bed with Wales and West up on the windy heights of Plas Morolwg.

Note also on this first page that under the ‘Tenure’ heading all the other projects are listed as ‘Social’, but not Plas Morolwg, which is ‘Neutral’. This I’m told means that it will either be private housing or mixed.

And yet, as I’ve explained in the main post, Wales and West is asking for Social Housing Grant to acquire the Plas Morolwg site. Yet we know a) Wales and West already owns the site and b) the Programme Delivery Plan now tells us W&W will not be building social housing.

So what the hell is going on here?

Scroll down to the third sheet (which I suspect is a continuation of the first) and you’ll find other Wales and West projects with information redacted. In fact, there are five redactions for Wales and West, the two for Mid Wales Housing, but none for Tai Ceredigion which has the most entries on these sheets.

So why does Wales and West Housing get such preferential treatment from the ‘Welsh’ Government? I can understand the reasoning behind commercial confidentially, but when it’s only applied to Wales and West it looks very much like favouritism. Or maybe hiding something?

P.S. I’ve also seen the Pembrokeshire Programme Delivery Plan, and there Wales and West has even more redactions. They may be connected with a development called Parrog Yard in Newport. Any information will be gratefully received and treated confidentially.