Tag: Foresight Group

The Destruction Of The Elenydd

On By JacIn Bute Energy, Climate, Colonialism, Environmentalism, Globalism69 Comments

I suppose I’d better begin by explaining where we are when I talk of ‘the Elenydd’. It’s the wild, and largely unpopulated uplands shown on this Google Earth capture.

The last true wilderness in Wales. Now it’s being industrialised and destroyed by the ‘renewables’ industry, all foreign-owned companies.

With other parcels of land being bought by ‘environmental’ groups and other sheep in wolf’s clothing. (That is not an allusion to the Fabian Society.) One of these groups gives the appearance of being Welsh, the others are the usual suspects; National Trust (NT), Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) . . .

Here’s how Google AI describes the Elenydd:

The least populated and wildest area in southern Britain . . .

The largest continuous tract of blanket mire in the Welsh uplands, designated as a Special Area of Conservation supporting rare birds like red kites, merlins, and diverse upland flora.

Clearly, we are dealing with a very special area – one that should be left to those who have cared for it for generations. But that would mean farmers and others, now viewed as the enemy by those who have elected themselves our saviours from evils as diverse as the climate crisis and the threat from the far-right.

For the two are invariably linked. Those dictating how we behave, even what we eat, in response to the ‘climate crisis’, are often the same people telling us what’s acceptable thinking in the political sphere.

Because it’s all about control. Controlling us.

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FURTHER BACKGROUND

I’m going to start with a document produced by the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ back in 2019, called Future Wales The National Plan 2040. There, in amongst this melange of hopes, dreams, incoherent ramblings and utter bullshit, on page 94, we find a map showing the areas set aside for wind farms.

They’re numbered and bounded in black. Roughly speaking, the Elenydd is north east of the area 8 panhandle and east of area 6.

Whatever the original purpose of this map showing ‘pre-assessed’ areas, it soon proved worthless and misleading.

A fact illustrated by the map below, produced by Caru Teifi, a group protesting against the pylon runs needed to take the electricity intermittently generated by wind farms to the grid connection point south of Carmarthen.

In the south it appears that most of the turbines built (light blue), and planned (dark blue) are outside the ‘pre-assessed’ areas.

And as you’ll see in a minute. it’s the same – or worse – in the area we’re looking at.

So what was the point of the ‘pre-assessed’ areas in the 2019 National Plan if the ‘Welsh Government was simply going to allow a “near enough” approach that borders on a free-for-all?

Time now to look at the wind turbine projects on the Elenydd. The known knowns, the known unknowns, the unknown unknowns, and the unknown knowns.

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WHAT’S PLANNED

We can safely identify four projects. Three we’ve known about for a few years, with another announced this year.

The first involves Scottish company Bute Energy Ltd. Their project is Lan Fawr. There was another project nearby labelled Bryn Brawd, but it seems they’ve merged. Now it’s one sooper-dooper project with 55 turbines up to 800ft in height. Labelled 1 in the image below, and in two parts.

Next is Belltown Power’s Waun Maenllwyd project. Just 4 to 6 turbines. Labelled 2 in the map above. It’s suggested the Belltown project might be taken over by Bute. Alternatively – and I find this interesting – that the Foresight Group, which is behind Belltown, might take over Bute!

Number 3 is Galileo Empower UK’s Bryn Cadwgan project. Galileo has it’s UK office in Edinburgh (and an outpost in Cardiff), but is owned by investors and pension funds from just about everywhere, as far away as New Zealand.

Lastly, we take a brief look at the newest of them, EDF’s Nant y Maen. This straddles the Tregaron to Abergwesyn road. It’s definitely in the pipeline; confirmed by this ‘WG’ document. EDF is wholly owned the French Government.

Local sources insist there are other projects yet to be unveiled. Two, it’s believed.

Access to these projects is planned from the A482 at Pumsaint. Something I covered in The Road To Hell back in November 2023. Then it’s over the old Dolaucothi Estate, now owned, like far too much of Wales, by the National Trust.

After Pumsaint, it’s anyone’s guess, but I guarantee it will involve new roads, hundreds or thousands of trees felled, and massive disruption to the environment over an extended period of time.

But before reaching Pumsaint the turbine columns and blades will be transported on huge diesel smoke-belching trucks along country roads from Swansea docks.

Disruption and destruction all the way so that foreign investors can make money.

Unless, of course, you’re stupid enough to believe that this is all being done to save the planet, and Wales will somehow benefit. Are you that stupid?

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‘WILL SOMEONE THINK OF THE NEWTS!’

In the intro I referred to a couple of recent purchases in the Elenydd by rewilders and others. So let’s look at them.

First, is one I covered in Land Of Our Fathers, But Not Our Children, in February. This concerned the purchase of 1195 acres by an outfit called Tir Natur.

The area bought is shown in this map by Caru Cymru I linked to earlier. It’s the dull green area below EDF’s Nant y Maen project. (I urge you to consult the Caru Teifi website maps and use the layers available to see what’s what in the area.)

Quite a purchase, and achieved with, according to Farmers Weekly and other sources, a “philanthropic bridging loan“. Wasn’t that nice!

Earlier this month, we learnt that the RSPB had bought 96 hectares at ‘Galltybere’ or ‘Gallt-y-Bere’, which is shown on OS maps (see above) as Craig Alltyberau. This adjoins the planned Galileo Empower Bryn Cadwgan wind farm.

And whaddya know – this purchase also received a “philanthropic loan“.

I wonder where these ‘loans’ come from? Can I have one?

Now for a detour, but not really a digression. We’re going to Scotland, sticking with the RSPB – and there’s more magic money!

Down the Firth of Forth from Edinburgh, not far from North Berwick, rising from the North Sea is the volcanic plug of Bass Rock. A home to many birds, and the largest colony of Northern Gannets.

These are magnificent birds, with a wingspan of six feet or more. While searching for prey they soar or glide until folding back their wings to dive into the sea.

Not far away is the Isle of May. This is home to 50,000 puffins, plus guillemots, razorbills, and other birds.

Hanging over this avian idyll is the threat of 307 wind turbines, in a project approved last year. As might be expected, RSPB Scotland objected. Stating:

Berwick Bank is a gigantic windfarm. To put it in perspective, it would take up an area four times the size of Edinburgh with more than 300 turbines – each the height of six Scott Monuments. 

But then something strange happened. Operating through the National Heritage Memorial Fund, the UK government made a grant of £586,000 to RSPB Scotland – to buy Bass Rock!

I can’t help thinking that what was really being bought was the RSPB’s silence.

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CONCLUSION

You don’t need to be cynical to believe that when there’s billions of pounds, dollars, euros or whatever in profits to be made, certain measures will be taken to guarantee those profits. Among those ‘measures’ will be neutralising the opposition.

Unless they’re powerful and well organised, local groups can be largely disregarded, developers can even play one off against another. The same principle applies to landowners and farmers. But when it comes to groups that are well-established, with a national or even international structure, and have the ear of politicians, then a different approach is needed.

And this might explain the magic money that appears regularly in the accounts of wildlife and environmental groups. Sometimes it’s out in the open.

Aviva, the institutional investor owned by Vanguard and others, has given just shy of £40m to the Wildlife Trusts to restore Celtic Rainforests along the western edge of Britain. Much of this money will be coming to Wales. Some already has, and it’s gone to the Elenydd.

I dealt with this February, in The Latest Enviro-scam – ‘Celtic Rainforests’.

In fact, it seems most 0f Wales is a rainforest. Who knew?

Though the Elenydd seems to be in the ‘Oceanic Climate’ zone rather than that described as ‘Hyper Oceanic Climate’.

At the risk of coming across as a cynical old bastard I’ll spell out what I think might be happening in the Elenydd. Shyster ‘developers’ want to destroy an almost pristine wilderness for profit, and have, by one route or another, given money to environmental groups to buy adjoining land.

The developers will then argue that wind turbines, and the work associated with them, pose no threat to wildlife or the environment. If they did – then surely their neighbours like Tir Natur and RSPB would be complaining. “Stands to reason, squire“.

For their part, the recipients of this largesse will tell themselves that sacrifices must be made for the greater good and the bigger picture.

For you must remember that those I’m describing have bought into the climate scam, making their position ambivalent. And rarely have I seen it more evident than in the RSPB Scotland statement I linked earlier.

We can unlock a future where Scotland’s already struggling seabirds are helped to recover, while producing the renewable energy needed to help fight climate change.  

So, for the greater good, sacrifices must be made. But that’s OK, as long as it’s the dicky birds making the sacrifice.

♦ end ♦

© Royston Jones 2026

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Bute Energy, Connections & Partners

On By JacIn Bute Energy, Climate, Colonialism, Ireland, Renewables, Wind Turbines58 Comments

This piece is in two parts. The first takes us to Ireland, the second . . . well, I’m not quite sure, maybe into a war zone.

For anyone new to the blog, or this topic, Bute Energy is a Scottish company with a Cardiff address planning a dozen or more windfarms in Wales, plus the pylon runs needed to connect them with the main grid. Also solar arrays and Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS).

The head man is Oliver James Millican who, along with the other Bute principals, Stuart Allan George and Lawson Douglas Steele, left Millican’s father’s Parabola property company towards the end of 2017. They may still be working for Parabola.

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‘IF YOU EVER GO ACROSS THE SEA TO IRELAND, THEN MAYBE . . . ‘

To begin with, I recently learnt that Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), Bute’s main funder up to this point, is now operating in Ireland. Taking advantage of Ireland’s Strategic Investment Fund.

The Ireland Strategic Investment Fund (ISIF) has committed €200m to specialist greenfield renewable energy infrastructure investor, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (“CIP”) latest flagship strategy, Copenhagen Infrastructure V (the “CI V”)

When I saw ‘CI V’ it rang a bell, because this is (or was?) the CIP fund behind Bute Energy. Mentioned more than once on this blog. Specifically, CI V Dragon Lender Ltd (launched 23.12.2021). Other companies with the CI V Dragon name are; CI V Dragon Topco Ltd (16.03.2023), and CI C Dragon Holdco 2 Ltd (07.12.2023).

All three are still in business, with directors I believe to be working for CIP.

There was a fourth company, CI V Dragon Holdco Ltd, formed 23.12.2021, with CIP directors. Two of whom left in November 2023, but two hung on until June 2025, when they were replaced by Oliver Millican. A liquidator was appointed in January this year. This outfit was clearly replaced by Holdco 2.

A lot of money went into the now-departed company, over £60,000,000. Which seems to have been used in payouts to Bute directors. This has been widely covered in the media; including Nation.Cymru. There are suggestions of, dare I say it – can I even spell it! – jiggery-pokery.

Here’s what Google AI says. Nation.Cymru is quoted, but the info came from this site.

Though a reporter for a London newspaper, who’s been in contact recently over Bute’s activities, tells me his ‘paper’s bean counters are not convinced Bute’s done anything illegal. Devious, maybe, but not, strictly speaking, illegal.

Whatever the answer, it seems that the money was doled out thus: Millican £47.56m, with George and Steele each getting £4.64m, and a few million going to minor players, one said to be Millican’s brother-in-law.

Much of Millican’s money was used to buy real estate in Scotland, often warehouses, and dealt with in this blog in March. Here’s a quote I used then from a Bute insider:

The real estate arm of the Windward portfolio . . . is working with multiple overseas businesses and at least one national government to house interests and commodity items relating to renewables infrastructure. There are warehouses in Wales and Scotland filled to the rafters with BESS and pylon materials – rented and landed for resale exclusively to the UK market to artificially appear to restrict overseas procurement and brand it as available when supply chains pinch in the late 2027 to early 2029 drive.

Windward is another name used by Bute companies, Windward Enterprises Ltd being the ultimate holding company for the Bute empire. Sole director and shareholder Oliver Millican.

A new director of Windward Enterprises, since June 1, is given as ‘Thomas Anthony Watson’. (Companies House was notified June 25.) A name common enough to be ignored. He is in fact, Labour peer, Baron Watson of Wyre Forest.

Last month Windward Enterprises took out a loan with private bank Brown Shipley & Co Ltd, ultimately owned by the Al Thani family, which owns and runs Qatar. This family also owns some £40bn of real estate in London, including Selfridges, Harrods, The Savoy, Claridge’s, Heathrow Airport . . .

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BUT WHY THE INTEREST IN IRELAND?

With Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners investing in ‘renewables’ in Ireland I naturally got to wondering if Bute Energy is similarly involved.

In an idle moment I typed ‘Bute Energy Ireland’ into Google, and it suggested a “corporate address” down by Anna Liffey. Here to be exact: 2nd Floor, Riverview House, 21-23 City Quay, Dublin, D02 AY91.

Which turns out to be the Dublin address of SYSTRA Ireland, part of a big French company, with projects around the world.

Next, I searched for ‘Bute Energy Systra’, and turned this up:

Bute Energy is a Welsh developer spearheading over £3 billion of onshore wind projects. They collaborate with global infrastructure and consulting firm SYSTRA. SYSTRA provides lifecycle services, electrical grid/infrastructure planning, and engineering for Bute’s energy parks to speed up the transition to a low-carbon grid.

“Welsh developer“! So there is a link. But why had I never heard of SYSTRA before? Next, my trembling digits tapped in ‘Welsh Government Systra’, and this came up:

SYSTRA is a prominent transport and engineering consultancy that frequently partners with the Welsh Government and Transport for Wales (TfW) to modernize public transport, boost regional connectivity, and achieve net-zero climate targets.

Then I found this on the SYSTRA website. Nice to see another Welsh company getting contracts from the transition to the wonderful Green economy.

On the Systra website I also unearthed these specific projects. A franchised bus service for Wales and an energy from waste facility on Deeside. Are there others?

Despite these contracts in Wales SYSTRA doesn’t even bother with the Bute ploy of having an office here. It seems Wales is handled from Bristol or Birmingham. Though there is of course an office in Edinburgh, which will be handy for the Bute boys. (In fact, SYSTRA’s Edinburgh address looks somehow familiar.)

AI coming up with SYSTRA’s Dublin address for Bute Energy is no real surprise. It’s pretty obvious this French company has its feet under the table with the so-called ‘Welsh Government’.

So, Bute is already linked with SYSTRA and CIP, both are now operating in Ireland, with Systra also well in with the ‘Welsh Government’. It’s therefore reasonable to assume that Bute may also be active in Ireland.

Which brings me to another reason for looking at Irish connections. I’m referring to the pylon runs from windfarms planned in central Wales (many by Bute) to Llandyfaelog, south of Carmarthen, where they connect with the main grid running from RWE’s Pembroke power station to England.

This has been covered extensively, both my blog and on the CPRW website.

While England was always the presumed destination for the electricity generated, it could just as easily go west to Ireland, thanks to the new Greenlink Interconnector at Freshwater West in Pembrokeshire.

This short (2:12 mins) news clip from RTÉ explains it.

The demand for electricity in Ireland is soaring, with some 80 AI data centers already, and more in the pipeline. Understandably, the state electricity board, EirGrid, is getting nervous.

No surprise then, that in addition to the connection from Pembrokeshire there’s another from Bodelwyddan to somewhere near Dublin, with MaresConnect. This is owned jointly by Etchea Energy, with offices in London and Dublin, and our old friends in the Foresight Group.

UPDATE: Bodelwyddan is mentioned in this announcement of an offshore development “entirely in Welsh waters“, between BP and Japanese company Jera, with a “proposed connection to the Bodelwyddan National Grid substation“.

As for Foresight, you may remember this lot attracting bad publicity in recent years for buying up Welsh farms on which to make money from planting trees to offset ’emissions’, or some such corporate bollocks.

And then there are the governmental contacts. Here’s a joint statement issued a year ago after first minister Eluned Morgan visited Dublin to meet Tánaiste Simon Harris.

Forums have enabled us to hear directly from Irish companies including ESB, Simply Blue and DP Energy, who are investing in energy projects in Wales. During the 2023 forum, ministers also visited the Morlais tidal stream energy project on Anglesey in North Wales

Last month, the new Plaid first minister, Rhun ap Iorwerth, was in Dublin.

And the links don’t end with politicos doing photo-ops. Here’s one between French giant EDF and Irish state-owned ESB. This offshore wind project’s called Gwynt Glas. The only thing Welsh about it is the name. (But that’ll be enough to please some.)

So Irish companies, with others from Scotland, England, and further afield, invest in renewable energy projects in Wales. A country that already produces more electricity than it could consume if we all drove electric Humvees and left our lights on 24/7.

But it doesn’t end there, because there’s also electricity being shipped down from Scotland. This was supposed to be taken by a lengthy pylon run from Pentir near Bangor to Swansea North, on the line from Pembroke to England.

Then again, it might not run down to Swansea at all; perhaps it – or some of it – could be sent to Ireland via the Bodelwyddan link. However you look at it, Wales is being covered in windfarms and other installations we don’t need, and criss-crossed with transmission routes going elsewhere.

Something noted by CPRW, which last month put out a press release warning that ‘Wales Must Not Become England’s Energy Corridor‘. Agreed. But I repeat, the way things are shaping up Wales is just as likely to become an energy corridor serving Ireland as well.

All the while those treacherous clowns in Corruption Bay mince around looking smug, and preparing their spare rooms for ‘refugees’ (or maybe not) – cos we is saving the planet, innit.

And anybody who objects is a climate-denying fascist. Well, I guess that’s me.

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JUDGED BY THE COMPANY YOU KEEP

Another development concerning Bute worth reporting is the funding from Dutch outfit Rabobank. Here’s the Rabobank website.

There are maybe two points to make about Rabobank. First, it’s big in agriculture and food . . . and buying farmland. Second, it has a rather worrying record.

When it comes to buying farms and land Rabobank operates through the subsidiary Rabo Farm and local intermediaries. These are often corrupt local officials. Worth asking if these officials were always corrupt, or was it the prospect of Rabobank money that corrupted them?

Come to that, how did Rabobank make contact with local officials in remote parts of Poland and Roumania? Did they have intermediaries with good contacts? I mention that Latin outpost because of a scandal just over a decade ago that saw local farmers learning they no longer owned their land. Read about it by clicking on the image below.

Rabobank has strong links with top-tier Globalists the Rothschilds. Maybe the latter rely on Rabobank’s expertise in food supply and pricing to help them towards the Globalists’ wet-dream goal of controlling the food supply. And with it, us.

Rabobank is also believed to be active in that most corrupt of eastern European countries, Ukraine. But the law there states that only Ukrainian citizens and entities can own land. Up to 10,000 hectares.

What this means in practice is that those close to the Cokehead Clown of Kiev often act as intermediaries for foreign investors. This goes some way to explaining the Bugattis, Lamborghinis and Bentleys with Ukrainian plates in Monte Carlo.

Rather cruelly they’re known as the “Monaco Battalion“. Which must be a great consolation to Ukrainians dying at the front to defend their corruption.

But then, dying on the front line nowadays is reserved for little people.

But the question is, why is Bute Energy involved with Rabobank at all? The new funder may now be branching out into ‘renewables’, but the primary interest remains land, farming, and foodstuffs. Are the two connected?

By which I mean, is Rabobank’s link-up with Bute connected to Bute owning ‘Welsh’ Labour, also now buying influence in Plaid Cymru; and Rabobank realising that both these parties want to end livestock farming. Which will bring many farms onto the market.

A Powys farmer confided recently, regarding Rabobank:

From my perspective, the concern is that this extremely powerful financial institution with deep expertise in agricultural land are now also financing infrastructure that competes for that land.

Whatever the answer, Bute Energy linking up with a company with Rabobank’s record should set alarm bells ringing.

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CONCLUSION

As I’ve said a few times in recent posts on the subject, I (and others) may have focused too much on Bute’s activities in Wales at the expense of the bigger picture. Which now seems to be emerging.

A picture that, first, confirms the electricity generated in Wales is for consumption somewhere else. I’d assumed that ‘somewhere else’ to be England. But that’s only part of the picture.

Electricity generated in Wales, and off our coasts, is also likely to be going to Ireland. This accounts for the interconnectors from Bodelwyddan and Freshwater West, and it might also explain the Irish companies investing here.

Will electricity generated by Irish companies in Wales be reserved for Irish consumers? I ask because while I appreciate there are interconnectors everywhere, and electricity can flow both ways, consumption in Ireland seems to be outpacing generating capacity.

Then there’s the power coming down from Scotland. It’s not for Welsh consumption. So why can’t it go directly to England and / or Ireland?

Do you remember Alexander Cordell’s book, Rape of the Fair Country, about the 19th century exploitation of Wales by Victorian industrialists? What we see today is the Globalist-Green rape of Wales . . . but without the jobs or any other tangible benefits.

It’s clear beyond doubt that Mam Cymru is being used, and abused. How much longer do we just stand by and let it happen?

♦ end ♦

© Royston Jones 2026

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Land Of Our Fathers, But Not Our Children

On By JacIn Colonialism, Environmentalism, Farming, Wind Turbines46 Comments

This post is about what’s described as “Wales’ largest rewilding site“. I suspect it’s about more than ‘rewilding’. Because there’s usually big money involved with ‘environmental’ schemes nowadays.

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TIR NATUR: WHO’S WHO?

I’ve written about this outfit a few times in recent years. But to get you started, here’s the Tir Natur website, and here’s the Charity Commission entry.

When I first encountered Tir Natur it seemed to be a very amateurish outfit, but now it appears more professional. (That’s not always a compliment.) And there also seems to have been an almost complete change of personnel.

The name I recall from the beginning was Stephen Jenkins. And he gets a mention on the website, telling us he’d left:

The capture above confirms that Tir Natur was formed in 2021. But not actually registered with the Charity Commission until June of 2022.

The only founding member still with Tir Natur might be Gwenan Jenkins-Jones. She’s had training in how to spot money laundering. Which might come in useful at a ‘rewilding’ charity.

These changes are also reflected in the address given.

For the address now shown with the Charity Commission is Moat Farm, Trimsaran, to the west of Llanelli. Though the old address, Y Beudy, Lanlwyd, Pennant, Ceredigion SY23 5JH, also appears on the website.

The Pontyberem address is perhaps where we’ll find the chair of the trustees, Tatatia ‘Tash(a)’ Reilly; for one of the farm owners is a Lindsey Reilly.

Tatatia was the director of a company called Dashtan Ltd. In the business of ‘Residents property management’, which was formed and folded in less than a year. A phenomenon which, as you know, always gets my antennae twitching.

Her co-director was Bogdan Edward Staniaszek. The company address was given as this property not far from Swansea city centre.

Did this in any way link with Tir Natur’s activities?

I suspect those living at Moat Farm are relative newcomers to Wales. ‘Nice little place in the country’ and all that. Same applies to a number of other Tir Natur trustees. I see two smallholders among them.

Definitely getting a whiff of good-lifers here. Though these are the ‘farmers’ Tir Cymru claims to be working with. None are real farmers.

Then there’s a couple of eco loonies who also come from outside of Wales. James Hitchcock, formerly of Montgomeryshire Wildlife Trust, and now Rewilding Britain. And Tim Birch, still looking over his shoulder for the Derbyshire gamekeepers he smeared, and now involved in just about every enviroscam.

Next, Bronwyn Jamie Bunt-Brown, who may be American. And was living in Surrey when she ran this short-lived company. And there was another company that never filed accounts, or seemed to do anything, before being struck off.

Bronwyn became a trustee 25 March, 2025. Someone who joined on the same day was Pamela Louise Noakes. While Bronwyn seems to have moved to Wales Pamela still lives in London, where she works for M&C Saatchi Group.

This company has worked with Rewilding Britain. Fancy! And is keen to offset its carbon emissions. Noakes’ role is Global Director of Sustainability. Curiously, this day job is not mentioned in her Tir Natur bio. Why would that be, I wonder?

Turning to the ‘Executive Team’, those who run Tir Natur day to day, presents very much the same picture, with the obvious exception of Gwenan Jenkins-Jones. I hope she’s getting well paid, because her mere presence is invaluable to this scam.

To help her provide a Welsh gloss there’s Dr Elen Robert, whose full-time job is as a translator for Natural Resources Wales. Is NRW – that is, us – paying her to do translation work for Tir Natur?

Kilner’s the one on the left, I think

Dan Ward’s day job is with North Star Transition, another interloper organisation.

I could go on, but I’ll just mention David Kilner who, as Development and Programme Lead, might be the top man. Dai is also involved with Climate Cymru, where ‘diversity’ seems to be more important than the climate or the environment.

I say that because you may recall it was the BAME department of Climate Cymru, back in 2024, that called for dogs to be banned from the countryside because they offended a certain group that really should start adapting and integrating.

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MONEY, MONEY, MONEY?

With money from somewhere, Tir Nature has bought (or “secured“) 1195 acres of Ceredigion. Here’s a report on the purchase from the County Times.

And here’s a video put out by Tir Natur.

According to an article last week in Nation.Cymru half of the £2.2m has been raised. Farmers Weekly talks of “a philanthropic bridging loan”

The Charity Commission website shows that over £900,000 appeared from somewhere before the end of June last year. But where?

Less than two years ago Tir Natur was skint. Though there is now at least one active Crowdfunder page. And there seems to have been an earlier Crowdfunding attempt that closed about a year ago after raising £60,000.

With a sizeable donation in match funding coming from Aviva which, as we know, works with BlackRock. Here’s more information on the Aviva Communities Fund, which has donated £28,264, that we know of.

One of the reasons I’m focussing on the money is because there are many examples of ‘rewilding’ projects and the like that have gone financially awry, perhaps taken on burdens that became too heavy.

One example of overreach would be Highlands Rewilding, which may be the model being followed by Tir Natur. This outfit struggled to pay off the bank loan.

If it’s not overreach then ‘rewilding’ is often a front for milking government schemes.

An example of this would be another case from the Highlands. With Aberdeen Investments being honest about the motives behind the company’s interest in ‘rewilding’.

The estate was acquired by abrdn three years ago for £7.5m as a way to offset carbon emissions from its property portfolio.

The Highlands now are over-run with investment funds and asset managers looking for ‘environmentalists’ to front for them so they can rake in the money from carbon capture and other wheezes.

And there are plenty willing to play the acceptable public face of corporate greed. New groups sprout quicker and better than any fungi they claim to grow.

Just yesterday a good contact drew my attention to Wild Cymru, which is rewilding 210 acres of Ceredigion, at Cefn Garthenor, near Tregaron. The farm is owned by Neil Alistair Hughes of Savoir Beds.

The Chair of Wild Cymru is Daniel Gruffydd Jenkins-Jones. Might he be related to Gwenan Jenkins-Jones of Tir Natur?

A few days earlier a different source told me about another outfit also operating in Ceredigion. This is Oxygen Conservation, which now owns the 300 acres of Esgair Arth.

The guy who seems to own the company, Roy Barry Bedlow, has a string of similar companies. And it’s all about investment, not the environment.

A number of his companies carry the ‘L C’ handle, which stands for ‘low carbon’. One of those companies is L C Energy, which supplies woodchip. But don’t worry, this isn’t shipped across the Atlantic, it’s all “sustainably sourced within the UK“.

Biomass is a scam within a scam. Get big grants to plant native hardwood trees, instead plant quick-growing foreign species, grab the grants and subsidies, chop ’em down, flog off the wood as ‘renewable energy’, sell the land, move on to the next scam.

It should go without saying that Roy Barry Bedlow is based in Jersey.

Finally, a worrying possibility raised by someone who knows about these things, is that this Tir Natur project might qualify for payments under the Sustainable Farming Scheme (SFS), which would not have been the case under the old Basic Payments Scheme.

This would be wrong, and can be avoided if the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ insists that food must be produced for any land or landowner to qualify for SFS payouts. Otherwise, it’s not farming, is it?

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NEIGHBOURS

Let’s take a closer look at the land in question, and its surroundings. Such as the planned windfarms. Didn’t I mention the windfarms! How remiss of me.

The map shows four planned windfarms and the land Tir Natur is claiming. As you can see, they are very, very close. (I am indebted to the group that provided the map.)

The orange access road running south from Bryn Cadwgan goes over National Trust land to the village of Pumsaint. This is the only viable access for the turbine parts and the vast amounts of concrete needed for each turbine base. I covered this issue in November 2023 in The Road To Hell.

Now you might think that the peace and tranquility promised by an area returned to nature doesn’t sit well with an industrial site next door. With work going on for years.

But it doesn’t end there. Word I’m getting from locals says Bute is scouting more land over towards Teifi pools and Pontrhydfendigaid, north east of Tregaron.

And then there are the three farms in the area reportedly bought by the Foresight Group, which has been been busy in recent years buying Welsh farms and planting trees for investors.

But now it gets rather curious. Because I’m told the farms sold to Foresight had not long before been bought by a stranger to the area who’d made his pile in pet cremations! Yes, honestly.

This man, James Uys, is originally from Stroud in Gloucestershire. He played rugby and cricket for the local teams, and is big in sheepdog sales.

His business was almost certainly Limekiln Pet Crematorium, sold to Pet Cremation Services. Pet Cremation Services Ltd is the trading name for Time Right Ltd.

I don’t know how much Uys got for the pet cremation business, but he seems to have sold it in November 2017. And subsequently sold Limekiln Farm in September 2023 for a stated £3,000,000.

Some locals think Uys is a stalking-horse for Foresight, maybe others. Which would be odd, given what he’s on record as saying.

The value of agricultural land is hitting record highs as rich people seek loopholes to avoid inheritance tax, it is being reported.

Wealthy investors who have discovered the legal technicality are snapping up fields – and as a consequence prices are soaring to around £11,000 an acre, making life difficult for farmers. One newspaper reported on the case of a 50-year-old farmer from Gloucestershire who is in the process of selling his hundred-acre estate so he can buy a larger plot elsewhere. James Uys says he hopes to make £3m from the sale.

Did Uys move west, where land is cheaper, to find that “larger plot“. For in addition to what’s discussed here, I’m also told he’s bought a farm near Rhandirmwyn.

Bizarrely, the most recent report I have of Mr Uys is that he is the new tenant of Penlan Farm, Upper Chapel, near Brecon. There were 22 other candidates, including many young locals.

The farm is owned by the Penllergaer Estates in Swansea. Which has an interest in solar farms, as I reported in November 2021. (Scroll to the section ‘Follow the Money’.)

UPDATE: As this section is headed ‘Neighbours’, here’s two of Tir Natur’s supporters talking about the project. One is Jon Moses of Right to Roam. The other is Alasdair Campbell, Executive Director of Somerset Wildlands.

Campbell talks dismissively of “these guys“, who are of course the local farmers. Believing, it would seem, that people like him should have more say about what happens in Wales than local people.

Two arrogant outsiders. Which about sums up ‘rewilding’ in Wales.

◊

CONCLUSION

Whatever Tir Natur may say, I believe they’re fronting for somebody else. Somebody hoping to make lots of money. I say that for a number of reasons.

First, the land Tir Cymru claims to have acquired is, as the video I linked to tells us, already a Site of Special Scientific Interest. It is already protected. For Tir Cymru to want to take it over can only mean they want to make changes.

Perhaps ‘reintroduce’ species like the Eurasian lynx.

‘I’m going to live in Wales’

Second, and in addition to be being an SSSI, the Elenydd is perhaps the last true wilderness in Wales. Consequently, to suggest it needs ‘rewilding’ is absolute bullshit. Like suggesting the Mona Lisa would be improved with a moustache and sunglasses.

Only those with a hidden agenda would insult our intelligence in this way.

But let’s take the claim at face value. If ‘developers’ have their way this ‘rewilded’ area will be surrounded by wind turbines. How will the constant hum and vibration, the flicker, affect wildlife? The lynx and other species will move out.

And the large, slow-moving birds that Tir Natur hopes to attract won’t stand a chance against the blades of the wind turbines.

Going back to the video again, the commentary claims to be “celebrating Welsh history and culture” – while snidely condemning that heritage for the bad farming practices Tir Natur wants to remedy.

Tir Natur promoting themselves as knights in shining green armour coming to save the Welsh environment – from those who have cared for it for over two millennia.

The video talks of bringing in Carneddau ponies. But a contact who knows the farmers that look after these animals says they’ve had no approach from Tir Natur. Which makes me remember a ‘rewilding’ scheme, near Machynlleth, that talked of “reintroducing” Welsh  horses – then they brought in a Polish breed!

Put it all together and you might understand why I’m a wee bit cynical. Why I don’t buy the story that the land Tir Natur has acquired in the Elenydd is just a ‘rewilding’ project, and nothing more.

I believe there’s much more to it.

FOOTNOTE: This week’s piece was to have been in two parts. The second part about a 625 acre farm on the Gwynedd side of Machynlleth bought by Montgomeryshire Wildlife Trust with Aviva-Blackrock money. I’m waiting for further information.

But that’s the state of rural Wales today. Those with roots in this land are being elbowed out by recent arrivals and groups serving the Globalists’ anti-human agenda. With many of them funded and supported by the ‘Welsh Government’ to do the elbowing.

It’s a form of Clearance.

♦ end ♦

© Royston Jones 2026

Buy Me A Coffee

Don’t Go Down To The Woods Today

On By JacIn Climate, Colonialism, Corruption, Environmentalism28 Comments

Another unplanned piece, but you know what it’s like, somebody gets in touch . . . This one throws light on some major environmental scams – ‘natural capital’ and ‘carbon sequestration’ or ‘offsets’.

This means buying a few trees, or a patch of land, then, if you’re a big company, claiming you’re saving the planet by just owning it (and holding your hand out); or, if you’re a spiv, flogging off shares to the brainwashed and the stupid.

It’s difficult to think of any form of self-harm more damaging than reducing carbon levels in the atmosphere; for carbon is the gas of life, without which the planet dies, and of which more is better.

◊

WHERE WE AT?

This is about two parcels of woodland. One, Coed Rhyal (13.3 acres), near Porth Tywyn; the other, Gigrin Prysg (11.8 acres), is along the A470 just south of Rhaeadr Gwy.

Both circled in red in the maps below. (Click to enlarge.) There’s another asset in Nova Scotia, Canada. The three bought by a company called The Sacred Groves C.I.C. Here’s the Companies House entry. And the Linkedin page.

All three directors are Indian citizens living the United Arab Emirates. So obviously not local to either of these woodlands.

Before pushing on, let me stress that the company name has nothing to do with Druids. (I would know if me and the boys was involved.)

Though I must say that I don’t understand why this outfit was allowed to register with Companies House as a Community Interest Company, because I see neither community involvement nor community benefit.

Anyway, let’s delve.

◊

WHO’S WHO IN THE SACRED GROVES C.I.C.

The first director named is Monisha Krishna. The second, Vikram Krishna. I assume they’re husband and wife. Though we can’t rule out them being siblings.

As we see from Monisha Krishna’s Linkedin profile, she is also a member of the Greentech Alliance.

The Founder and CEO of this lot is Lubomila Jordanova. Linkedin tells us she’s also the founder and CEO of PlanA. Where the website advises us to:

Before setting up PlanA in 2017 Lubomila “worked in investment banking, venture capital and fintech in Asia and Europe“. She is also an Advisory Member of the European Investment Bank.

Here’s a little more about Fräulein Jordanova, from the website of a “connectivity event” to be held in Barcelona. I’ve highlighted a few bits that caught my eye. Such as:

Aligning sustainability with profitability.

Here’s Vikram Krishna’s Linkedin page, where we learn that immediately before starting up Sacred Groves he worked for the National Bank of Dubai.

Another banker! But then, banking and saving the planet are natural bed-fellows.

The third director is Achipra Sreedharan Sudhir. He works for FlyDubai, “owned by the Government of Dubai“.

Since Sacred Groves was launched, in February 2020, there have been no less than seven share issues. Here’s how the 1.25 million shares are currently distributed.

Does seven share issues in five years suggest business is brisk?

The latest accounts filed with Companies House are good for a laugh. Just look at this below. When did you last read such vacuous waffle?

Thankfully, and despite the company returning a loss of £321,458, the directors managed to pay themselves £250,000. Phew! I was so worried.

◊

‘SEQUESTRATION’ – OF SUCKERS’ MONEY

In fairness – and despite the heading – there are I believe two possibilities to explain what Sacred Groves is about. More on this in the next section.

Let’s return to the website, where we read:

We secure natural habitats through either direct acquisition or long-term contracts with landowners and governments, map them using geospatial imaging, and convert them using advanced analytics into virtual Sacred Groves Clusters (SGCs).

It also says, “a price of £40 for a 10-year term“, but seems to have left out, ‘per month’. And ‘minimum of’. (See below.)

So what is a “cluster“? Well, as we read on the website:

Each acre of land secured will be virtually divided into an average of 275 clusters

Which means that Coed Rhyal will produce roughly 3,658 ‘clusters’, and Gigrin Prysg some 3,245.

So how much would it cost you to invest in these ‘clusters’, or to give one as a birthday gift? And don’t forget – Christmas is coming! Well, here are the prices quoted on the website:

You could have 5 ‘clusters’ for £200 per month. Per bloody month! Assuming all ‘clusters’ are sold, Coed Rhyal will pull in for Sacred Groves £14,632 per month. Gigrin Prysg a measly £12,980.

Over a ten-year period Coed Rhyal would earn Sacred Groves £1,755,800 and Gigrin Prysg £1,557,600. A total of £3,313,400. And how much would be earned from the ‘sequestration’ and linked scams?

(Are my calculations correct? Cos maths was never my strong point.)

Though the pricing is rather strange. Normally, the cost per unit reduces if you buy more. (For example, Malbec in Aberystwyth Tesco.) I’d hate to think those running Sacred Groves are greedy!

To put it all in perspective, Sacred Groves paid £44,000 for Coed Rhyal. And £34,000 for Gigrin Prysg. (The latter bought from Forestry Resource Ltd.)

In addition to selling off ‘clusters’ Sacred Groves is asking for donations, and also flogging off tat jewellery.

◊

VARIATION ON A THEME, OR A SYNTHESIS OF TWO

Trees are being used to profit from the climate scam in a number ways.

We’ve had companies like the Foresight Group buy up good farmland in order to plant trees for corporate greenwashing. With Foresight acting for its clients or investors.

We’ve also seen big companies buy farmland or woodland directly.

But, unless Sacred Groves director Achipra Sreedharan Sudhir is representing his airline employer, there appears to be no corporate involvement.

So are we looking at a variation on a different theme? Something like the timeshare scams that operated in Spain a few years back.

While here in Wales we had Gavin Lee Woodhouse, buying hotels from Llandudno to Tenby, and leasing out rooms individually. Young Gavin got too greedy, and started selling leases for rooms in nursing homes . . . that never got built.

“Can’t lose, squire . . . every time somebody stays in your room you get paid. And at the end of it,  you’ve always got the lease. But if you’re not satisfied I’ll buy back the lease. What’s not to like“.

Nothing really, apart from the fact that Gavin was a crook, and the suckers never saw any money. Gavin launched the Afan Valley Adventure Resort. What a lad!

Or the Chisellers From Chislehurst, with a similar care home room-lease scam?

Maybe it’s like selling Irish-Americans a framed certificate to put up on their wall saying they’re part-owner of a square metre of bog in the fair County Galway.

With these scams, those behind them just keep on selling the timeshare, or the lease, or that bit of the ould sod. Over and over.

Maybe, as I suggest in the heading, Sacred Groves’ operations in Wales are a blend of two types of scam we’ve observed over the years.

Whatever the answer, scammers will always be with us, but what really pisses me off is the official support and funding they get.

◊

CONCLUSION

If we go to the Sacred Groves Facebook page we see videos informing us that both Sacred Groves’ Welsh woodlands have been accepted into the National Forest for Wales network. They’re marked with crosses on the map below.

Hear National Forest Liaison Officer Dafydd Lloyd wax lyrical over “detritus” in the stream at Gigrin Prysg; while colleague Owain Grant enthuses over Coed Rhyal.

This acceptance by the National Forest is being used as accreditation by Sacred Groves. Proof that they’re to be trusted. But are they?

And then there’s the funding linking with the National Forest project. Such as the Woodland Investment Grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund. And this isn’t the only funding available.

The reasoning behind Sacred Groves is explained at the start of this video starring Vikram Krishna. With the analogy of the ‘worthless’ spring. Worthless until the water is bottled and sold.

Similarly, the trees at Coed Rhyal and Gigrin Prysg are ‘worthless’ until Sacred Groves capitalises on them. But this has sod all to do with the environment. It’s naked greed, the monetisation of the natural environment.

This seems to be the Sacred Groves scam in a nutshell:

1/ Buy woodland you’ve probably never seen, through an agent like Carter Jonas, the company used by Sacred Groves.

2/ Sit back, do nothing, call it ‘conservation’.

3/ Sell or lease the land in parcels or ‘clusters’ to silly buggers with more money than sense.

4/ With the added benefit of being paid for ‘sequestration’ and associated scams.

5/ Having bumped up the value of the woodland through all this scamming, you can sell it off at a big profit on the original price paid.

The real beauty of it is that it’s legal. Legitimised by the acceptance of the climate scam. And then, encouraged and funded by governments.

On the bright side . . . I’m sure the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ would interpret Sacred Groves’ exploitation of Wales as inward investment.

So don’t get too angry or despondent – think of all the jobs!

♦ end ♦

© Royston Jones 2025

‘Farming’ – The Globalist Way!

On By JacIn Environmentalism, Farming, Globalism25 Comments

Let me stress that the blog is not back, as such, not up and running as in days of yore. I’m just putting out the occasional piece.

This one because it complements last week’s offering about Globalists who dreamed up the ‘climate crisis’ now profiting from measures introduced to combat that fantasy.

And as with last week’s piece, we’ll see asset management funds, fund managers and the rest, staying in the background, operating through intermediaries.

◊

WHERE WE AT?

The farm in question is Rhos-farch, above Pennal. South-facing land overlooking the Dyfi and rising up to Tarren Hendre, the highest point in the immediate area (633m), shown in pink on the maps below.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

The consensus is that the farm’s been bought by Montgomeryshire Wildlife Trust. There’s even a suggestion it’s been “gifted“.

Either way, the rumours talk of money provided by Aviva, the insurance company, which often fronts for BlackRock; which uses bodies like WWF, and Wildlife Trusts, to disguise the origin of the funding.

Nothing surprising there, because Aviva is working with other wildlife trusts in Wales, sometimes as part of the temperate rainforests restoration project.

Here’s estate agent Savills’ information for Rhos-farch. We see it covers 625 acres, and the asking price is £3,500,000. The property offers . . .

Diverse leisure, sporting, tree planting and environmental opportunities.

Strangely, there’s no mention of farming.

A1 Overview suggests the farm has done well from ‘Welsh Government’ or Natural Resources Wales funding over the past decade.

The farm participates in Welsh Government schemes like the Woodland Creation and Woodland Restoration Schemes. 

Farmers Weekly hints at further goodies available from tree planting.

The woodland includes coniferous and deciduous varieties and there is potential for further planting as identified by a recent feasibility survey carried out by Natural Resources Wales.

Though I’m struggling with this because the FW article is dated February 6, 2024, while what I assume to be the relevant document, the Machynlleth Forest Resource Plan, wasn’t approved until April.

Did somebody have a crystal ball?

The reference further confused by the fact Rhos-farch doesn’t seem to figure in the maps provided in the document.

◊

OTHERS INVOLVED

Scrolling down the estate agent’s literature we see that the solicitor listed (presumably acting for the vendor) is Agri Advisor. A Welsh company that’s expanded considerably in recent years, and now has branches everywhere.

There’s no branch in Cardiff itself, but there is one at Henstaff Court, just off the M4, south of Creigiau.

In cases like this, I like to get my bearings, but in this case Google Maps couldn’t take me beyond the entrance. Yet what I saw there was intriguing.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

Now you’re wondering why I highlighted the names of Agri Advisor and RSK ADAS.

Some may remember that RSK ADAS has appeared on this blog before. First, in Snake Oil And Land Grabs (December 2023), then More From Ireland Moor (October 2024).

In the first piece linked to, I said:

Tracing the ownership of RSK ADAS eventually gets us to Los Angeles and “global alternative investment manager” the Ares Management Corporation. You may not be surprised to learn that among the largest of Ares’ shareholders we find both BlackRock and Vanguard.

Agri Advisor and RSK ADAS being on the same board could be pure coincidence. But there are already too many worrying linkages and connections in this story to allow for any more coincidences.

Agri Advisor presents itself as the friend of the farmer, run by solicitors from Welsh-speaking farming families, a pukka Welsh organisation. Yet I have some doubts.

I feel it’s got increasingly close to the ‘Welsh Government, perhaps through Farming Connect, the state-run body for ‘good’ farmers.

Another source of confusion is the website, which has the company “Established in 2011“. But Companies House says Agri Advisor Ltd was formed in February 2013, Agri Advisor Holdings Ltd in May 2015, and Agri Advisor Legal LLP in February 2016.

The first two have always filed as dormant, the LLP is the operational company.

Then there’s the fact that AA has worked with wind farm companies. One I’m sure of is Belltower of Bristol, where the ownership trail takes us back to Foresight Group Holdings Ltd of Guernsey.

And if the name ‘Foresight’ rings a bell, it’s because this outfit has been buying up Welsh farms for distant investors to greenwash away their sins by planting trees.

Foresight is well in with the ‘Welsh Government’, and is no longer limiting its activities to wind turbines and trees. Its new Cardiff office seems to be run by former Development Bank of Wales staff.

So maybe Agri Advisors is now telling farmers they have to ‘adapt’, to give up land for renewables, ‘carbon capture’, rewilding, and all the other bollocks that serve no purpose except to further enrich the Globalists who dreamed up the ‘climate crisis’ scam.

All in all, it increasingly looks as if Agri Advisor is running with the hares and hunting with the hounds.

To conclude. Rhos-farch has either been bought by the Montgomeryshire Wildlife Trust with money from Aviva, Foresight, or possibly the ‘Welsh Government’; or it’s been bought by one of these and handed over, with strings, to the Trust.

Could we be looking at another Gilestone?

◊

CONCERNS

Rhos-farch has been sold by a couple I won’t name, but I cannot ignore the fact that the wife is a very senior civil servant with the ‘Welsh Government’.

I might have ignored her if she was in education, health, transport, or some other area, but here’s a clip from her Linkedin profile.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

And then I found this, referring to the husband:

. . . before acquiring his own holding and further acreage, taking his holding to 1200 acres, increasing the sheep and suckler cow numbers along with diversifying into tourism, letting residential properties and renewable energy and timber production.

This all refers to land and property in Montgomeryshire, not to Rhos-farch.

After reading it I was drawn back to what Savills said in its sales blurb:

 The current woodland is within both a Woodland Creation Scheme and Woodland Restoration Scheme regulated by Natural Resources Wales and with a number of years remaining on the contracts.

The unavoidable question is: have this couple’s land holdings and other assets benefitted from ‘Welsh Government’ decisions with which the wife was involved?

◊

SOCIALISM AND FARMING

Socialists have been hostile towards farmers since the Tolpuddle Martyrs were shipped off to Oz in 1834, and it was reinforced a century later by Stalin’s war on the kulaks for starving the workers and peasants. (Famine that had nothing to do with ‘Uncle Joe’ and collectivisation.)

When such attitudes became passé after the fall of Communism, socialists’ animus was revived by the Globalists and their buddies in various supranational bodies inventing the ‘climate crisis’. This also gave the Left a new excuse to target another old foe – capitalism.

But while many of the bruvvers still thought in terms of the caricature capitalist with top hat, big cigar, and dark satanic mills, the twenty-first century variety makes nothing, and is in fact pulling their strings.

And so the comrades’ new crusade was to save a planet being destroyed by farting cows and people who make things. In other words – destroy agriculture and de-industrialise the West. The Globalist agenda.

Which results in the industry with the highest percentage of Welsh speakers, the ‘glue’ holding together many rural communities, being destroyed by lying bastards who claim they want a million Welsh speakers by 2050.

◊

AND FINALLY . . .

To understand how Globalism operates, look no further than the UK Online Safety Act. Said to be protecting children from online harm but, in reality, censoring views that challenge or expose the Globalist agenda.

Globalist greed, and the desire to control, is filtered through captured politicians and a bought media, and either hides behind a ‘Who-could-object-to-that?‘ smokescreen, or else is premised on a lie.

On the plus side . . . the Globalist project is faltering; its Leftist and Muslim foot-soldiers are seen for what they are, its liberal useful idiots are ridiculed, Woke is dying, and no one is going to fight WWIII for Zelensky and his crooked friends.

Reducing the Globalists to open, blanket censorship and ever more obvious lies.

All-out confrontation can’t be far away.

♦ end ♦

© Royston Jones 2025

Green Man, Red Herring?

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Welsh Government38 Comments

When someone drew my attention to the Green Man festival being gifted a farm by the so-called ‘Welsh Government’ I thought to myself, “I’m sure I’ve written about those buggers recently”; but no, I was thinking of the Green Gathering.

There are just so many using the ‘Green’ label, desperately trying to look enviro-virtuous! Bullshit, most of the time.

For those who may not recall it, the Green Gathering featured last September in Invasion of the Enviroshysters (PG), scroll down to the relevant section.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

The more recent story I’m referring to appeared last Friday on the BBC Wales website. A strange piece in many ways. For a start, why would the ‘Welsh Government’ buy a farm and then hand it over to people running a music event?

As is so often the case in these investigations, one thing leads to another. And that’s what happened here.

♦

GILESTONE FARM

As you’ve seen from the link above, the story begins with, Gilestone farm, near Talybont-on-Usk. The property can be found on the map below, with the farm name highlighted in the centre.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

To understand what’s happening now, and the anger it’s causing, we need to step back a bit, some 17 years.

And let’s introduce Geraint John Thomas, whose family has farmed in the Talybont area for centuries, maybe a millennium. He owned Gilestone Farm.

I won’t go into too much detail, partly because I may be meeting up with Geraint and his wife Chris early next week. But enough has already emerged to put out what you’re about to read.

Which will make any Part 2 I produce a kind of prequel. (Just think Godfather.)

Another reason for doing it this way is that my digging has unearthed intriguing links that may help us understand what’s happened at Gilestone.

Anyway, let’s sketch in the background. The problems began with planning permission granted by the Brecon Beacons National Park planning department in 2005 for caravans and camping at Gilestone farm.

By 2007 it had become clear that the BBNP, or certain individuals, had screwed up rather badly. (Which might explain the record being scrubbed, for I could find nothing on the BBNP website relating to that planning case.)

This report from 2008 tells that the planning department was by then, effectively, in special measures.

By 2010 we are reading that a High Court judge had quashed the original planning consent and, following very expensive litigation, the owners of Gilestone Farm found themselves with little alternative but to sell up.

This report from September 2018 tells us that Geraint and Chris Thomas, with their 5 children, have started afresh near Aberaeron. And being the grafters they are, they’ve made a success of their new ventures.

Then, just a year ago, their story was updated by WalesOnline. They’re obviously prospering . . . which is not always popular in socialist Wales.

But then, last Friday, all the bad memories were brought back with the report I linked to earlier. Though what I found odd was that neither the ‘Welsh Government’ nor the Green Man was prepared to talk to the media, so who leaked the story?

After reading that report, Christine Thomas put out a piece on her Facebook page, from which I reproduce the extract below.

   “We had sheds burnt down, we were banned from local shops and pubs, the children were bullied every day in school- it was horrific
     All because we had planning for a caravan park, and the locals did not want valleys people there
     The welsh government were instrumental in what happened to us-

◊

HANDS ACROSS THE POND

The man who bought Gilestone Farm from Geraint and Chris Thomas was Charles William Weston, who made the purchase in the name of Sharpness and Severn Transport Ltd, which has been renamed – rather modestly – CWW Farming Ltd.

I had trouble figuring out exactly what Weston owned at Gilestone because the property seems to have been broken up into a number of different titles. There is even an instance of the same title number relating to different sections of the overall holding.

These are the titles I found, and here’s a pdf version with working links. (Click on the title number.)

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

Weston now seems to have betaken himself in the general direction of the City of my Dreams; specifically, the area around Crai.

Though he maintains a couple of companies containing the “Gilestone” name, such as Gilestone Leisure Ltd, Incorporated 02.12.2014, and Gilestone Glamping Ltd (Inc 02.12.2019).

To keep himself busy, Weston has also joined the recently-formed Beacons Water Group CIC (BWG). An interesting outfit this, which you’ll be reading more about.

There are six directors. Four have surnames we’d expect to find in a Welsh farmers’ organisation, the other two are Weston, and Anthony Hugh Martineau. The latter lives on a farm and is also Head of Sustainability at Map of Ag.

Another member is Richard James Roderick, chairman of the Brecon and Radnor branch of the National Farmers Union (NFU).

The BWG  is generally described as a “farmer-led” group set up to guarantee water quality in the area. And who could argue with that? As ever, the truth is rather more complex. Let’s start with this extract from the BWG 2021 accounts.

We learn the inspiration for the Beacons Water Group came from Dŵr Cymru / Welsh Water, following a visit made to the Catskills region of New York state. The Catskills form the northern end of the Appalachian mountain chain.

The ‘BBMC’ referred to is Brecon Beacons Mega Catchment. Click to open enlarged in separate tab.

The Catskills initiative is called the Watershed Agricultural Council (WAC) and is controlled to some extent, and funded, by New York City – to which the area supplies water – and the US federal government.

Revealingly, perhaps, the internet address for WAC is nycwatershed.com.

Though on reading about the WAC, the question that formed in the old Jac noggin was, “How did Dŵr Cymru even learn about this initiative so far away?”

The panel above goes some way towards answering that question by mentioning two trans-Atlantic visits. The first was in March 2018, when a group from the WAC visited Wales. As we see from the Dŵr Cymru tweet below, retweeted by the WAC.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

Then, in October 2019, a contingent from Dŵr Cymru reciprocated with a visit to the Catskills. But I could find no mention of this on the WAC Twitter account.

UPDATE 23.06.2022: Here’s a report of the visit by Dŵr Cymru accompanied by some Powys farmers.

Though what you see below from around the time of the Dŵr Cymru visit may put us on the path to enlightenment.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab.

The Bard College mentioned in the tweet is a Woke-Left institution in New York State favoured and funded by George Soros. The Manipulative Magyar’s influence in Wales is often channelled through Black Mountains College in Talgarth.

That’s right! – just a few miles from Gilestone Farm.

In One Planet, Future Generations & George Soros (June 2019) I explained that there are clear connections between Soros and Black Mountains College.

BMC Chief Executive Ben Rawlence worked for Soros’s Open Society Foundations, also Human Rights Watch, a body that has seen much Soros funding.

BMC Trustee Dr William Herbert Newton Smith was, as the BMC website tells us: ” . . . for 20 years head of George Soros’s higher education programme, establishing over 20 universities around the world.”

These included the Central European University in Budapest, Hungary. Until my mate, Vik, gave them the bum’s rush.

Among the BMC ‘advisors’, along with Sophie Howe, Jane Davidson, and other Labour deadbeats, we find “Hugh Martineau Sustainable Agriculture Consultant”.

Yup, the same Martineau we saw earlier at the “farmer-led” Beacons Water Group.

Martineau is clearly well in with the Corruption Bay establishment. Here we see him being promoted by the ‘Welsh Government’s Wales Rural Network. Though what a chilling phrase “farming newcomers” is. Just think about it.

Hugh Martineau is on the right, local NFU chairman, Richard Roderick, is on the left. Click to open enlarged in separate tab

If we were talking about young Welsh people from farming backgrounds they’d already know more than Martineau. Which means that the headline can only refer to those, almost certainly from outside of Wales, buying Welsh farms.

Or taking on Welsh farms someone else has bought for them?

The link between Black Mountains College, Bard College, and George Soros, was recently strengthened through the Open Society University Network (OSUN).

Soros unveiled OSUN at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2020. Read this article. This really is Orwell’s Ministry of Truth. We have arrived in 1984.

Click to open enlarged in separate tab

If we turn to Black Mountains College most recent accounts (page 4, under ‘Operations’) we read: “BMC was inducted into the global Open Society University Network (OSUN), allowing us to offer our programmes to students from 50 institutions around the world”.

But no mention of Uncle George!

I suggest you read the latest accounts to help you grasp the links between BMC and other institutions, such as the Centre for Alternative Technology. And the funding from the ‘Welsh Government’, through the Arwain programme and other sources.

One organisation linked to BMC – and don’t fall off your chair in surprise! – is Dŵr Cymru / Welsh Water, which is sponsoring the Ecological Futures Camp in late August – early September. (Take a look at the other sponsors!)

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The accounts also mention (page 4) an anonymous gift of £50,000. Bloody hell! Should a small educational establishment in receipt of public funding be allowed to receive large, anonymous donations?

But this generosity is dwarfed by the gift from Jenny Mathilde Daneels Watt of Switzerland. Jenny splashed out £960,000 last year to buy Troed-yr-Harn, a 120-acre grassland farm and then, so we are told, she lets Black Mountains College have use of it for a peppercorn rent.

Isn’t that nice of her, boys and girls!

Here’s the title document for the farm (no plan available), and here’s the title document for an extra little piece she bought (with plan).

So another Welsh farm is lost to the nation.

The question you’re all asking is, “Who the hell is Jenny Mathilde Daneels Watt of Switzerland and why would she be so generous to Black Mountains College?”

I’m asking the same question. Answers on a postcard, please!

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WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT?

Why would the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ pay £4.25m for a farm it seems unsure what to do with, and then say it will be rented or leased to an organisation that has yet to make a comment, and has presented no business plan?

Part of the answer is, in a word, control.

Understand that we are dealing here with the socialist mindset that wants to control Wales and almost every aspect of Welsh life. If this can’t be done openly and directly, then it will be done surreptitiously, through proxies.

This is how the Labour Party has operated in Wales for a century. It explains the corruption, the cronyism and, regrettably, Wales’ poverty relative to other countries.

Why should farming, or the land, be treated any differently?

But before explaining what I think is behind the purchase of Gilestone Farm take a few minutes to enjoy Vaughan Gething, Minister for Economy (‘economy’!), flim-flam his way through questions in the Senedd on Wednesday.

Also understand that the Labour Party is ideologically and emotionally hostile to farmers and landowners. I could bore you with an explanation that takes us from the Inclosure Act (1773) via the Tolpuddle Martyrs (1834) to Kinder Scout (1932), but I’ll spare you.

Let’s now focus on the sale of Gilestone Farm.

I can’t be sure how and by whom the trans-Atlantic link was established, but at some point the idea that the mayor of New York City can influence farmers many miles away in the Catskills became seen as a good idea, to be replicated in Wales.

Which explains why the Beacons Water Group CIC was set up soon after the link was established between our own water supplier and the area supplying NYC.

Among the directors of BWG we found Richard Roderick, the local NFU branch chairman. Interestingly, Roderick farms directly across the Usk from Gilestone Farm.

Another BMC director is Alun Thomas, who farms within waving distance over Llangorse lake of Hugh Martineau.

Making the Beacons Water Group a cosy little gang. What’s more, there are plans to extend the idea, thanks to Cardiff University, which often seems to be joined at the hip with the ‘Welsh Government’.

The link in the previous paragraph takes you to a page headed: “Environmental resilience for water in rural Wales”. We read of, “Creative partner collaboration with Mrs Penelope Turnbull”.

Penelope Turnbull designs the interiors of cruise ships! She’s also been a window-dresser for Harrods!

How the fuck did she get this gig!

What does she know about farming? Or water quality? Come to that, why does a group set up to improve water quality on Welsh farms need a “Creative partner”?

Has the world gone mad, or is it just Wales? This could drive me to drink!

End of digression-rant.

Those belonging to the BWG are viewed as ‘good’ farmers, environmentally responsible and therefore to be favoured by politicians and their minions.

‘Good farmers’ will promote the globalist agenda that seeks to destroy livestock farming and have us eat gunge made in a factory owned by the increasingly weird, if not sinister, Bill Gates.

This couples with a change of tack from the ‘Welsh Government’.

For it has become clear, even to the blinkered and insensitive denizens of Corruption Bay, that hedge funds and City investors buying up Welsh farmland for various forms of greenwash does not go down well with the Welsh public.

Far better for the ‘Welsh Government’ to buy farmland and hand it over to favoured individuals and groups. Or it may be Dŵr Cymru doing the buying, or Natural Resources Wales. 

Here’s a recent example of such a purchase.

Without the trans-Atlantic link facilitated by Soros-backed institutions, we would not have seen the creation of the Beacons Water Group, and without the BWG the ‘Welsh Government’ would not have bought Gilestone Farm from Charles Weston.

The real story here may be the adoption and adaptation of a US arrangement that will be used by the ‘Welsh Government’ to reward those farmers who follow the globalist agenda while isolating those with principles.

Pour encourager les autres.

A bit crude, maybe incomplete, but this is how I see the general flow of influence or power in the subject you’ve reading about. Click to open enlarged in separate tab

The Green Man? Even if this outfit is taking over Gilestone, it’s just a distraction.

♦ end ♦

 

© Royston Jones 2022


How Green Is My Racket

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Environmentalism, Greens, Welsh Government13 Comments

THE CARBON COMMUNITY

This post began when I was directed to the tweet you see below. Thirty-two grand is a lot of money, so what is The Carbon Community?

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Well, basically, it seems to be a husband and wife, plus a second woman, who a few years ago set up both a registered company (limited by guarantee, Inc: 21.10.2019), and a charity (06.01.2020).

The husband and wife are Charles Martin Nicholls and Jane Kentish Nicholls. While the third director / trustee is Heather Blain Allen. Here’s Allen’s Linkedin profile.

There is another company, Carbon Community Trading Ltd (Inc: 26.10.20). Jane Nicholls is not a director, and the sole share is held by The Carbon Community.

The use of ‘Trading’ suggests carbon sequestration.

Both companies, and all three directors, give as their address a private property in Windsor, Berkshire, which I take to be the Nicholls’ family home.

In addition, Heather Allen is a director of Carbon Copy Network, which claims to promote ‘local climate action’. This is also a registered company, limited by guarantee (Inc: 14.11.2019).

Most of the projects mentioned on the website are in Wales. Which is odd seeing as none of those involved seems to have any connection with Wales.

Among the other three directors is Claudia Michaela Jaksch, who works for Policy Connect, ” . . . a cross-party think tank. We improve people’s lives by influencing public policy”.

In other words, lobbyists. Who could operate in Wales without having to register.

Were the people whose lives Policy Connect claim to be ‘improving’ ever consulted?

I find that a rather sinister example of the zealots’ “We know what’s best for you”.

The usual mantras from the Carbon Community website. In translation they read: ‘Put farmers out of business – free up land for people like us’; ‘Stick solar panels on your roof – that will never repay the capital outlay’; ‘Get poor people off the roads – making more room for those of us who can afford electric cars’. Click to open enlarged in separate tab.

Moving on . . . what land has The Carbon Community bought?

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THE LAND IN QUESTION

Here’s a map of the area where The Carbon Community operates. Close to the Heart of Wales (Swansea-Shrewsbury) rail line and the famous Cynghordy viaduct.

Here’s the map in PDF format. You may wish to keep it open in a separate window because I’ll be referring to it regularly.

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Let’s start by going back to the Companies House entry for The Carbon Community. Click on the ‘Charges’ tab and you’ll bring up an outstanding charge for a £200,000 loan made by director Heather Allen. Here in PDF format.

Scroll down to page 32, and above the signatures you’ll see a number of Land Registry title documents mentioned. These are all relevant to this article. (Plus another I dug up elsewhere.)

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Let’s look at them in more detail:

CYM119517 “Land and buildings at Penlan, Cynghordy, Llandovery (SA20 OLW)”. You’ll notice that this title is in the name of Philip Michael Stoyle (of whom more later).

WA851663 “Land at Cynghordy, Llandovery”. This is indeed owned by The Carbon Community, and the lender is named as ‘Heather Allen’. And here we have a plan. Unfortunately, it came in four parts at the end of the title document. I’ve done my best to stitch them together.

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What you see outlined in red is a large area of land lying east of Coed Alltygyrnig, which you’ll find in the centre of the OS map above.

Note also, page 3, paragraph 2: ‘”(21.04.2020) The price stated to have been paid on 20 March 2020 for the land in this title and in CYM119497, CYM119512, CYM800919 and WA852717 was £600,000.”

Which means that Heather Allen’s £200,000 only covered a third of the purchase price. Did the other directors put in £200,000 each? Or did the money come from somewhere else?

Here are the other relevant titles. (Or maybe just the ones I’ve found!)

CYM119512 “Land at Llanerchindda, Cynghordy, Llandovery”. Again, there’s no map, though the land referred to may be included in the plan with WA851663. Llanerchindda can be located centre-left top on the OS map.

CYM119497 “Land lying on the west side of Gwern-Gwinau, Cynghordy, Llandovery”. There is a plan attached, which refers to a footbridge across Afon Brân.

WA852717 “Land at Cynghordy, Llandovery”. This lies to the south east of the main holding shown in the plan with WA851663 (above), separated by a field or two, and backing onto the railway line and Coed Gallt-y-gyrnig on the east.

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CYM800919 “Land at Penlan, Cynghordy’, Llandovery”. This plot was bought by The Carbon Community in March 2020, and must be somewhere near Penlan or ‘Pen-y-lan’ where we earlier found Philip Michael Stoyle.

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THE PLANNING APPLICATION

While I was idly Googling various names that crop up in this narrative I ran across a planning application for Gallt y Gyrnig, elsewhere known as ‘Alltygyrnig’, even ‘Galt-y-gyrnig’. Here it is.

The planning application was for the, “Reinstatement of abandoned farmhouse along with the conversion of an adjoining redundant outbuilding to provide additional residential accommodation”.

Full planning approval was granted 21.10.2021.

That’ll cost a few quid.

The map that accompanied the planning application shows that the land in question is across the railway line, and south east of Coed Alltygyrnig.

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Even though the planning application was submitted by Charles Nicholls, the property is owned by John Lloyd of Cynghordy Hall. The local Big House.

Has an arrangement been entered into between Nicholls and Lloyd that if planning permission was obtained then Gallt y gyrnig would be rented, leased, or bought?

In total, we’re looking at a substantial amount of land bought or being eyed up by The Carbon Community. And there may be more.

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NEIGHBOURS

I earlier mentioned Philip Michael Stoyle, who owns or lives in Penlan or Pen-y-lan. I can’t positively link him with The Carbon Community, but you never know.

What I do know is that he set up two companies in 2014, both with addresses in England. Adviseinc Ltd (26.02.2014) and Philinc Ltd (30.06.2014). Adviseinc still uses a London address, whereas Philinc switched to Penlan in June 2017.

Neither company would be worth dwelling on were it not for the fact that the other director of Philinc is a Paul Horsman. Possibly this Paul Horsman of Greenpeace.

The adjoining parcels of land owned by Stoyle, at Penlan, and Cynghordy Hall at Coed Alltygyrnig, would complement what The Carbon Community already owns.

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On the left we see the land to the east of Penlan / Pen-y-lan owned by Philip Michael Stoyle. This fits atop Coed Gallt-y-gyrnig, owned by Cynghordy Hall.

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BUSINESS BACKGROUND

When someone pops up on my radar I like to get at the background. And so it was with Charles Martin Nicholls of The Carbon Community.

To make sense of this whole story we should focus on three companies using the ‘SeeWhy’ name. These are SeeWhy Software Ltd, SeeWhy Holdings Ltd, and SeeWhy (UK) Ltd.

All three went belly-up and were finally dissolved in 2016 and 2017 owing millions of pounds to assorted creditors. The last Summary of Liabilities for SeeWhy Software quoted a deficiency of £5,465,866.50.

The last to go under was SeeWhy (UK) Ltd. The only share held by . . . SAP (UK) Ltd, a subsidiary of German company SAP SE (Societas Europaea).

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Charles Nicholls’ background is obviously in computer software, yet he seems to have reinvented himself as an environmentalist!

Or maybe not. For I suggest this ‘transformation’ can be explained by looking more closely at his links with SAP, and how SAP now links with The Carbon Community.

One obvious link is that SeeWhy was bought by SAP in 2014.

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Which means that when the SeeWhy companies with which Charles Nicholls was involved folded, in 2016 and 2017, he was perhaps, if indirectly, working for SAP.

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SAP SE

SAP SE is a German software company. Wikipedia says: “SAP is the largest non-American software company by revenue, the world’s third-largest publicly-traded software company by revenue, and the largest German company by market capitalization”.

Possibly the largest company in Germany. Wow!

SAP SE is mentioned on The Carbon Community website but of course that rang no bells for me. But as we’ve seen, it is mentioned in connection with Seewhy (UK) Ltd, and then again in the Annual Report submitted to the Charity Commission, where we read:

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And while The Carbon Community has relatively little to say about SAP, this major international player is proud to trumpet its involvement in Wales.

In December 2020 the SAP website announced –

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In March 2021 we learnt: “SAP announced its intention to become carbon-neutral in its own operations by the end of 2023 – two years earlier than previously stated.”

Later in the same announcement we read: ” . . . at local level. SAP UK has partnered with The Carbon Community to plant the SAP Forest UK in the Brecon Beacans (sic) in Wales, with the aim of capturing just under 2,000 tonnes of carbon over the next 35 years.”

In June last year, we read that SAP was investing money in The Carbon Community.

I believe SAP is the real owner of what The Carbon Community calls ‘Glandwr Forest’. Which explains “SAP Forest UK” in the panel above.

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I also feel confident enough to set out the following scenario:

Wanting to cash in on the Welsh carbon capture scam SAP turned to Charles Martin Nicholls and he set up The Carbon Community as a front.

If I’m right, then most of the money to buy land around Cynghordy came from SAP. Heather Allen had to contribute £200,000 because she lacked the SAP connection.

She may be representing a different party.

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FINAL THOUGHTS

Among the documents on the Carmarthenshire planning portal relating to Gallt y gyrnig I found a letter of objection. It poignantly illustrates the tragedy being engineered in the Welsh countryside.

” . . . grandson . . . eleventh generation of farming in the valley . . . tradition of farming . . . I am not in posession of a computer or email”.

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Oh, I bet the smart-arses sniggered when they read that.

But the farm is gone. Bought by persons fronting for a German software giant with the ‘Welsh Government’ chipping in to the tune of £32k. With perhaps more to come.

Paying a company this big and wealthy to buy Welsh land is beyond absurd; it is obscene.

The Glastir Woodland Creation scheme must be reformed. Payments should be made to established farmers only; in order to keep Welsh families on the land, and to defend our identity and our communities.

How many more little outfits, and ‘community’ ventures, apparently tootling along on donations and volunteers, are in fact fronting for corporate leviathans? Does the ‘Welsh Government’ know? Does the ‘Welsh Government’ care?

As a first step in cleaning up the carbon capture racket I urge the ‘Welsh Government’ and Natural Resources Wales to insist on the return of all funding given to SAP via The Carbon Community.

Finally, in the best interests of Wales – and their own credibility – those speaking on behalf of the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ need to stop pretending that what I’ve described here isn’t happening.

♦ end ♦

© Royston Jones 2022