Labour Apparatchiks Associated With Bute Energy Arrested In China Spy Probe

On 06.03.202611.03.2026 By JacIn Bute Energy, China, Corruption Bay, Welsh Labour, Wind Turbines66 Comments

You must know what this is about. But in case you’ve been sleeping for a week . . . three men, with close ties to the ‘Welsh’ Labour party, were arrested last Wednesday “on suspicion of assisting a foreign intelligence service“. They were released on bail the following day.

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WHO’S INVOLVED?

The first, is David James Taylor. Originally of Ruthin, now perhaps London. But he spent most of the intervening years working as a special advisor (spad) to a number of prominent Labour politicians.

These were Rhodri Morgan, first secretary of Wales between 2000 and 2009. Peter Hain, one-time anti-Apartheid campaigner, MP for Neath, who held a few posts in the UK government, and now sits in the House of Lords. I seem to think Taylor might also have done a stint with Morgan’s successor, Carwyn Jones.

Around a decade ago Taylor got himself involved in wind energy. More on this later.

Last year he started working for Asia House. (It’s been taken down from the website.)

Next up is Steven Jones. He has already been removed from the website of the lobbying group Camlas Cymru, for which he works in Cardiff. He definitely worked for Carwyn Jones. As this report makes clear.

Also non-personed by Camlas is the third man arrested last Wednesday, Matthew Aplin.

‘Camlas’, I suggest, might be translated into English as canal or channel.

Camlas was founded, as Positif Politics Ltd, in January 2006 by Daran Hill and his wife. But Hill was sent down in July 2023 for sharing images of child abuse.

Hill links with Taylor through a company called (after a couple of name changes) Leckwith Ltd. This was started by Taylor in November 2011 and taken over by Hill on New Year’s Day 2018. Leckwith was Dissolved just over a year after the exchange.

Was Hill killing off a possible competitor? If so, how much did he pay Taylor?

Whatever, Taylor then became a client of Hill. As I found out in a DM exchange back in August 2020. (Full version here.)

The other individual named in media reports, but not arrested, was Taylor’s wife Joani Reid, Labour MP for East Kilbride and Strathaven. The grand-daughter of Jimmy Reid. (Despite his politics, I always had time for him.)

They might have met when Reid was a councillor in Islington from 2014 to 2022.

Reid claimed no knowledge of her husband’s business activities. But why would she link the arrest to his business dealings? He was arrested on suspicion of spying.

Following Taylor’s arrest, Reid said in a statement that she is “not part of” her husband’s business activities.

So what have we got? A young MP, only elected in 2024, on the right of the Labour party, and certainly not privy to state secrets.

Of the three men, none is a nuclear scientist, or a high-ranking military officer, so I think we can rule out slipping the Chinese Communist Party important information.

Which leaves me to conclude that what they’re suspected of is commercial in nature. Unless of course, the CCP is planning to take over the ‘Welsh’ Labour party. But if the comrades in Beijing rummage in the drawers, and check down the backs of the sofas, they might find a receipt for that shower.

Whatever they paid – they wuz robbed!

Let’s proceed on the assumption that any offence commited is of a commercial or financial nature.

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MORE ON DAVID JAMES TAYLOR, INTRODUCING BUTE ENERGY

For perhaps ten years David James Taylor has been involved with renewable energy. More specifically wind power. His involvement is due to developers realising how useful he is through his contacts in the Labour party that’s run the Welsh parliament for 27 years, either alone or with a junior partner in the Lib Dems or Plaid Cymru.

All this is covered in the many, many pieces I’ve put out on Bute Energy.

A good place to start might be Hendy Wind Farm, not far from Llandrindod. Where nary a turbine has turned. The eponymous company was launched in May 2011 by Matthew Simon Weiner, Graham Prothero, Michael Henry Marx, and Charles Julian Barwick.

There were linked projects at Bryn Blaen, near Llangurig, and Rhoscrowther on Milford Haven waterway.

Behind it was an outfit called U+I, taken over late in 2021 by Landsec.

The original directors were joined in August by Steven John Radford who, in May 2011, had launched Njord Energy Ltd. This company is in the process of being wound up. A new Radford company launched last year is Njord Wind.

Planning permission for Hendy was refused by the local council in April 2017, and this decision was upheld by an inspector in May 2018. At the council meeting a lobbyist tried to hand a note to the councillors and she had to be ushered away.

The woman was Anna McMorrin, working for Invicta Public Affairs of Newcastle. A Labour stalwart, she became MP for Cardiff North in the general election of June 2017.

As I say, permission for this windfarm was refused; but then came a strange incident that defied – and still defies – explanation. In October 2018, Lesley Griffiths, the Energy, Planning and Rural Affairs Secretary for the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ said she would ignore the planning inspector’s decision and allow Hendy Wind Farm to go ahead.

By this time David JamesTaylor had developed an interest in wind turbines (which may link with his failure to be elected North Wales PCC in May 2016). Taylor’s an ally and friend of Griffiths. Here he is campaigning for her.

A month before Griffiths’ bizarre decision a company was launched called Windward Generation Ltd. Later re-named Bute Energy Ltd, then RSCO 3750 Ltd, and Dissolved in September 2023.

The original directors, from Scotland, were Oliver James Millican and Lawson Douglas Steele. They were joined six days later by Radford.

Bute Energy has since spawned many companies planning windfarms, solar arrays, Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS), and pylon runs from central Wales; one to just south of Carmarthen where it’ll meet the main grid from Pembroke running through the south and on to England, the other running north east and over the border near Oswestry.

The ultimate holding company for them all is Windward Global Ltd, formed 16 May 2017. The only shareholder is Oliver James Millican. He’s the son of Peter Millican of real estate company Parabola. Millican, Steele, and the other member of the Bute troika, Stuart Allan George, had all worked for Parabola, and all ‘left’ at the same time.

Taylor was soon involved. Becoming a partner in Grayling Capital LLP. And holding shares in Windward Energy Ltd, both in his own name and that of his company Moblake Associates Ltd. These shares seem to have been sold in July 2022.

But why was Taylor given these shares in the first place? Why was he a partner in the LLP? What was he doing for Bute?

I’ll conclude this section on Taylor by saying that in the Moblake Ltd accounts for year ending 30 April 2021 we find this entry.

There’s no explanation of where the money came from that he gave himself as a ‘loan’. Even though it’s before the sale of the Windward Energy shares I still assumed this money came from Bute, for services rendered.

Moblake soon went into liquidation.

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POSITIF, CAMLAS, BUTE

In the first section I mentioned David Taylor’s link to child pornography fan Daran Hill, and Hill’s company Positif. Since renamed Camlas. And we saw that the other two men arrested with Taylor are Camlas employees.

Camlas is owned by Rhodri ab Owen. Rhodri’s brother is Senedd Member Rhys ab Owen, who sits as an Independent following a minor lapse that saw the pearl-clutchers of Plaid Cymru distance themselves.

These brothers are the sons of lifelong Plaid activist and Assembly Member the late Owen John Thomas, with whom I had a few jars back in The Good Old Days when the party prioritised Wales and Welsh interests before going far left then Woke.

Camlas seems to be another Plaid-Labour hybrid. (Like Deryn.) For as we’ve seen, and despite Plaid ownership, there’s plenty of Labour involvement. Another from that quarter worth mentioning is Naomi Williams, the partner of Labour SM Jack Sargeant, who did 14 years with Positif-Camlas and ended up as Managing Partner.

Another Camlas-Labour connection is provided by Matthew Hexter. He worked for Camlas for over three years, as a Senior Political Consultant, before becoming a Special Adviser at the Wales Office.

Bute Energy is a client of Camlas. And as I’ve established above, Taylor has a lengthy association with Bute. But Taylor’s now moved on, and since September last year he’s been Head of Programmes for Asia House in London.

I don’t know much about Asia House, but it has many contacts in China. That’s almost inevitable, with China being the largest Asian country. And there needn’t be anything suspicious about it. Except that China is a country controlled by a Communist regime with its hand in everything.

Taylor’s most recent company is Earthcott Ltd. Launched 1 September 2021. The latest accounts, to year ending 30 September 2024, show a big increase in assets and cash. And, as we saw earlier with Moblake, there’s no explanation for where it comes from.

Is this to be paid to himself as a loan that doesn’t need to be repaid?

Idly flicking through the Asia House accounts filed with Companies House, I soon came upon the capture you see below, which rang a bell. But why?

Rathbones is a major investment company, with its roots in Liverpool. Like most asset and investment companies nowadays it’s keen to make money from ‘renewable’ energy. But let me explain why I found Rathbone’s involvement interesting.

The Rathbone family still benefits handsomely from such investments. One member of the family sits in the Senedd, Jenny Rathbone, SM for Cardiff Central since 2011. As Wikipedia tells us:

Rathbone descended from the Rathbone family, with many members being notable merchants and politicians. Rathbone’s great aunt is Eleanor Rathbone, one of the first women elected as a Member of Parliament.^[16]^[17]^[18] Her great grandfather was William Rathbone V, who was Lord Mayor of Liverpool.^[19]

Jenny Rathbone is a big supporter of ‘Renewables’. And “sits on the Climate Change, Environment and Rural Affairs Committee“. But it don’t end there.

Her husband, or partner, John Uden, who knows bugger all about wind energy, had a sinecure created for him by Bute Energy on its ‘Welsh Advisory Board’ a few years back. Another member recruited was redundant Labour MEP Derek Vaughan.

In fact, Bute has been hoovering up people with influence in the Labour party for some years. A recent addition is Sophie Howe, former Future Generations Commissioner, who’s now a director of Bute Energy Ltd.

And it seems to have started with David James Taylor, because the boys from Edinburgh didn’t know anybody here until they recruited him.

But now, with the wind in their sails, Plaid Cymru seem to be the target. One notable recruit being 29-year-old Baroness Carmen Smith. She was selected for the Lords by the party hierarchy over the members’ choice of former MP Elfyn Llwyd.

Did Bute have a hand in that? Because Smith works for Bute.

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UPDATES

Martin ‘Shippo’ Shipton, of ‘Welsh Government’-funded Nation.Cymru, had his door kicked in just after 6am last Wednesday by an “eight-strong team from the counter-terrorism division of the Metropolitan Police“. As he reports here.

To believe him this was all a misunderstanding due to a completely innocent visit he made to Hong Kong, with David James Taylor, to meet representatives of the Chinese Communist Party.

Fair enough, squire . . . except that Shippo has made his admiration for Communist China clear on a few occasions.

He sounds like a visitor to Stalin’s Russia in awe of the grain harvest.

And on Friday the Western Mail gave him a big spread. Though I was initially confused by the reference to “top Welsh journalist“.

Shipton is a biased lefty propagandist subsidised with our money. If it was up to me I’d have him ‘cuffed, dragged off to some quiet place, where he’d be encouraged to respond to the gentle persuasion of a rubber hose.

But, then, I’m a far-right bastard . . . who respects democracy, who wants to defend freedom of speech, who rejects censorship and Digital ID, who realises that Net Zero is a Globalist scam, who knows that Covid was engineered by some truly evil bastards.

Just another nobody who loves his country, and realises who its real enemies are.

And I’ve got a sense of humour!

In other news, Taylor’s wife, Joani Reid, has resigned the Labour whip.

Another property has been searched. So who is it? Well, he’s a former aide to Tom Watson, former deputy leader of the Labour party, who now sits in the House of Lords.

Watson became a director of Bute company Windward Energy Ltd in September 2024.

I could go about Labour party connections with Bute. For example, funding is said to be coming from Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, where we find a former Danish PM, who happens to be the wife of Stephen Kinnock, Labour MP for Aberavon.

With more investment coming from the Welsh local government pension pot.

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CONCLUSION

Welsh politics is corrupt. It’s a cess-pit. There could be no other way after a century of Labour party dominance and the cronyism and nepotism that goes with it.

With devolution third-rate politicos have been bossed around by spads and advisers, civil servants answering to bosses in London, and bullied by lobbysists and others. All of whom have more influence in Corruption Bay than we, the people they were elected to represent.

Which explains so much. Such as why Wales is the only country in the Western world without a register of lobbyists. Because the lobbyists didn’t want it!

In recent years, new players have added to that corruption.

Among these new players, Bute Energy is prominent. It wants to plaster rural Wales in 250-metre-tall wind turbines, cover good land with solar panels, and destroy what remains with pylons.

And Bute’s done this through buying political influence. The boys from Auld Reekie know how the game is played. And it was so easy when you’re dealing with thick-as-shit politicians, with no business sense – but stupid and gullible enough to believe that human beings are destroying the planet!

And for what? Unreliable and expensive ‘renewable’ energy. While China builds one coal-fired power station after another. While supplying us with components for wind turbines and complete solar panels.

And there is already Chinese interest in ‘renewables’ in Wales. Brenig wind farm, in the Clocaenog forest, is owned by the China General Nuclear Power Corporation of Guandong Province.

Wales & West Utilities is Chinese owned. After trawling through a labyrinth of ownership you eventually come to West Gas Networks Ltd. Check out the shareholders. Tracing back to Li Ka-shing.

It would relatively easy for China to begin a takeover of the UK energy market in Wales. There’d be little or no oversight from incompetent politicians who’d dress it all up as ‘diversity’ or ‘foreign investment’, or some such nonsense.

With the mainstream media, aided by the likes of Martin ‘China’ Shipton and Wee Willy Hayward, denouncing critics as racists and Sinophobes.

I don’t want it to look like I’m picking on Bute Energy, but it’s certainly a link between those who were pulled in. Bute, and of course the ‘Welsh’ Labour party that Bute’s so successfully infiltrated.

On top of which, people are telling me that Bute, perhaps due to mounting local opposition to its plans, is looking to sell up.

I’ll say no more. Form your own conclusions from the evidence I’ve presented.

♦ end ♦

Globalist Muppets Seek (Somebody Else’s) Land

On 19.11.202519.11.2025 By JacIn Abergavennyshire, Climate, Colonialism, Environmentalism, Farming, Globalism, Greens, Ireland26 Comments

Over the years I’ve written about people and organisations in Wales dreaming up problems and pushing agendas with you and I expected to fund their activities through a captured political class.

In recent years, I’ve had to widen my horizons. Because it’s clear these shysters are now getting corporate funding from the USA and elsewhere. Which is often carefully ‘filtered’ to disguise the source. But always remember – He who pays the piper . . .

Which introduces the latest offering . . .

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THE OLD HOME TOWN LOOKS . . . WELL, DIFFERENT

Last Wednesday saw a conference in Swansea organised by an outfit claiming to be the Welsh branch of the global Wellbeing Economy Alliance (WEALL). Basically, local faces hoping to fool us into thinking WEALL cares about Wales.

Much like the so-called ‘Welsh Government’. Or devolution itself.

It was held at the Swansea Building Society Arena on Oystermouth Road, which pedestrians can access over the ‘Crunchie Bar Bridge’.

To check out who was starring at this ‘Festival of Ideas’ just scroll down to ‘Speakers and Panellists’.

There was Derek Walker, the Future Generations Commissioner. A man with a first-class seat on the gravy train. And his successor at Cwmpas, Bethan Webber.

Cwmpas is the UK’s largest development agency for social enterprises and co-operatives. The organisation develops and delivers innovative programmes to support enterprise, increase employment, tackle poverty and promote inclusion.

Translated that means socialists interfering in things they know nothing about. Terrified of letting the economy be run by people who know what they’re doing because such people would be unlikely to take advice from the comrades.

They prefer socialism which, as history tells us, has always been a great success.

There was a couple at the conference from Oxfam. Assorted jobsworths from health boards and ‘Welsh Government’. A man of whom I know nowt except that he must have the whitest teeth in Gwynedd. Then there’s the ‘Welsh Government’s early warning siren for Islamophobia who runs the Kumbaya Caff in Cardiff.

Finally, Yvonne Murphy, of Omidaze Productions, which I mentioned in May last year in connection with that nest of bruvvers, the Tramshed. Though I don’t know why Omidaze needs a website, because Companies House tells us it files as dormant, with nary a penny in the kitty.

Omidaze was mentioned last year because of Murphy’s collaborator Leonora Thomson, who’d come down from London to take over the Welsh National Opera . . . and became a councillor in Cardiff. A good example of the link between the Labour party in Wales and public appointments.

But if Omidaze was Murphy’s ticket to this knees-up, then it don’t say much about the credibility of the others. Anyway, here’s the full run-down of the speakers.

I bet you’re sorry you missed it!

(‘Weall’ is someone’s play on weal, meaning well-being, as in ‘common weal’.)

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WHO’S WHO IN THE WELLBEING ECONOMY ALLIANCE?

Let’s first go to the Charity Commission entry for the parent body, and click on the Trustees tab, who do we see? Why, it’s Sophie Howe, Derek Walker’s predecessor as Future Generations Commissioner (and another Labour stalwart). Her entry reminds us she’s also a trustee of Coleg Soros in Talgarth.

Then trustee Professor Kate Pickett gets a mention on the Club of Rome website. (I was astonished to see such a connection.)

Pedro Tarak is an Argentine, which would normally put him in my good books, but he too has dodgy connections.

Jumping to the top of the list, as chair and co-founder of the Wellbeing Economy Alliance with Professor Pickett, we find George James Stewart Wallis. And this link explains:

Stewart Wallis served as Executive Director of the New Economics Foundation (NEF) from 2003 to 2016. Prior to coming to NEF, he worked as a development consultant at the World Bank, and the International Director of Oxfam GB. Currently he is leading a major new initiative to create a global “new economics movement” called WE All (Well-Being Economy Alliance).

Finally, Ashis Tajhya. Who is also connected with the New Economics Foundation.

Multiple organisations overlapping, interlinking, reinforcing and echoing each other’s nonsense. All soaking up money from corporations, taxpayers, or charities. But wherever it comes from it’s money that could be better spent alleviating real problems.

The real problems of the people they claim to be serving.

∼

Turning to Wales, here’s the website and the blog for what claims to be the local incarnation of this organisation. These seem to be the individuals involved.

WEALL Cymru/Wales Ltd is registered with Companies House from an address in the Swansea Uplands. One of the directors is Siân Jones, whose husband Rowland seems to be in the property business; to judge by the companies he’s involved with, and the loans from building societies and banks to buy property.

Though one company, Tirnod, is indebted to the ‘Welsh Ministers’ and also Tai Tarian (re-named NPT Homes Ltd). So is he buying property for a housing association, or for himself and then renting or leasing to the housing association?

Another of the WEALL Cymru directors is Dawn Lyle.

While the Joneses and Lyle live in Swansea, the fourth director, Stephen Priestnall, can be found in Abergavennyshire. His day job seems split between two companies he founded. One is Decision Juice, the other Oomph Ltd, both now owned by Person Centred Software Ltd.

And by following a long and tortuous trail we learn that Person Centred Software is ultimately owned by City ‘escapee’ Matthew Rourke, and Leona Campbell. Through Cow Corner Holdings Ltd, an investment company.

Cow Corner can be found in that bastion of the Greens, Brighton. For Priestnall is a former Green party candidate.

My guess is Priestnall brought WEALL to Wales through his connection with Person Centred Software and that company’s connection with NEF. But why did he recruit people in Swansea?

But forget the property dealing and the investments – it’s all about wellbeing.

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LAND REFORM 1

Another offering for those who’d gaily tripped over the Crunchie Bar Bridge was a meeting to discuss land reform. (I can’t believe I wrote that!)

But who, exactly, is demanding, or even debating, land reform? Are there wild-eyed yokels in your area, pitchforks raised, burning torches at the ready, demanding that you all march on the ‘Big House’.

What the hell are these people talking about?

For God’s sake, this is twenty-first century Wales, not late-nineteenth century Ireland, with the Land League defending tenants against absentee landlords.

Then again, seeing as Leanne Wood was part of this circus, maybe Russia in the 1920s would be a better analogy. I can see her now, stirring up the peasants against the kulaks. (Though I’m not sure what she knows about ‘land’.)

Just as there were those serving bigger agendas in both Ireland and Russia, so history repeats itself with ‘The Big Land Reform Debate‘ in Wales.

The Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) was the organising force behind land reform in Ireland, as part of the bigger struggle for Home Rule. The Bolsheviks were behind the campaign against the kulaks, in order to facilitate collectivisation.

And so it is here in Wales. Because the objective is to grab land currently being farmed by Welsh families.

And while it was possible to sympathise with Irish tenant farmers, and Russian peasants, I find myself repulsed by faux ‘environmentalists’, vegans, rewilders, socialists, hippy farmers, and anyone calling themselves ‘progressive’.

Behind those discussing land reform in Wales, filling the role of the IRB, and the Communists, we see the Globalists. Who want that land so they can profit from wind turbines, greenwashing, tree planting or ‘natural capital‘.

And of course, with farming destroyed, they’ll also control the food supply.

And that is what ‘Land Reform’ is all about in this context. Though I worry that those attending the Swansea event may be too stupid to realise they’re being manipulated.

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LAND REFORM 2 (OR ‘GIMME ACCESS!’)

Also in attendance at the carnival of posturing and virtue signalling was the British Mountaineering Council (BMC). Represented by ‘Eben Myrddin Muse‘. A graduate of Cardiff University who did work placement with the ‘Welsh Government’.

Eben is also an academic researcher with Greener Edge Ltd. Another outfit run by a couple who moved from England (Kent) because the grass in Wales is greener . . . as are those running health boards, councils, and other bodies with public money to fritter away on ‘consultants’.

Anyway, here’s something of Eben’s I was sent. (From Facebook?)

I’d like to focus on a few points from the above contribution. For example, he says:

Improving Welsh communities’ access to land should be a top priority for any party seeking to lead Wales in 2026

Really! Who the hell is talking about improved access to land – is it those wild-eyed yokels again? The truth is, nobody gives a toss – apart from those who were in Swansea last week.

Just ask yourself, is it more important than the economy? The NHS? The education of our children?

Of course not. And to pretend otherwise is absolute bollocks!

What’s more, it has nothing to do with ‘Welsh communities’ being denied access to land. In order to understand what’s really behind this nonsense we must remember that young Eben was there representing the British Mountaineering Council.

And the BMC wants ‘wild camping’. Which means irresponsible buggers going onto someone else’s land, public or private, and doing what they damn well like.

Also, let me explain why the Scottish example quoted cannot work in Wales.

Wales in total is 20,779 km², but the area of Highland Council alone is 25,653 km². The Highlands has vast open spaces, grouse moors and shooting estates almost as big as a Welsh county, with much of the land owned by foreign billionaires and corporations. Wales, by comparison, a few areas excepted, is a patchwork of family-owned farms.

Another consideration is reachability. Tyne-Wear (pop 1.1 million) is the only major urban centre within three or four hours travelling time of the Highlands. Whereas Eryri and the Bannau are both within two hours or so of Merseyside (1.47 million), Greater Manchester (2.8 million), and the West Midlands (6.2 million).

With Bristol, Leeds, Sheffield, East Midlands, even London, not much further away. Altogether, that’s most of England’s population.

I’m sure you’re a tidy boy, Eben, and you mean well. So stop pushing silly agendas that work against your own people’s interests. I mean, how can you claim to care about the environment then push for wild camping with results like this?

Perhaps we can re-visit this topic after the ‘Welsh Government’ has decolonised our rural areas because, as everyone knows, the countryside is deeply racist.

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CONCLUSION

Socialism has always wanted to bring down the West, thanks to an absurd belief that it would raise something better from the smouldering ashes.

Countless examples proved that socialism fails. Everywhere. Every time. So it needed to rebrand itself.

Which explains why it re-emerged spouting the fresh idiocies of Wokery, and pushing the self-destructive lunacies of degrowth and Net Zero; while also preaching DEI, anti-white racism, and open borders.

All designed to achieve the old objective of bringing down the West.

As before, private property will be targeted. Whether it’s a family farm or a home you paid for 30 years to own. But it’ll be dressed up as “wellbeing” and “access“.

And this explains why Globalism allied itself with, and now directs, this revamped variant of socialism.

And that’s what last week’s conference in Swansea was really about.

♦ end ♦

Bute Energy And Others, A Round-up

On 01.10.202513.10.2025 By JacIn Climate, Environmentalism, Globalism, Wind Turbines82 Comments

I haven’t devoted a full piece to Bute Energy and the rest since August last year. Which is somewhat remiss, seeing as the plans are ongoing and causing great concern to communities across the land.

That said, maybe this offering is directed more at the general reader than those who follow Bute’s activities closely, or are involved with a particular campaign group, of which there are perhaps too many. (More on this later.)

Though I’ve had a gutsful of Bute and the other eco-scammers who’ve taken up more space on this blog than the diamond geezers and career criminals.

Yet they’re lauded in the media, have politicians in their back pocket, and the red carpet is rolled out for these exploitative interlopers.

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INTRO, RECAP

After a visit to the cellar, dusting off a few files, I think I’ve found my first reference to Bute. It was back in November 2018. In the piece, Corruption in the wind?

Though Bute first appeared via a connection with someone I’d already written about.

This pathfinder was Steven Radford. He was fronting for a major player named U + I in three wind farm projects: Bryn Blaen, near Llangurig; Rhoscrowther, down on the Haven; and Hendy, a few miles from Llandrindod.

U + I was soon taken over by Landsec; big shareholders in Landsec are BlackRock, Vanguard, Legal & General, Jupiter Asset Management.

In that November 2018 piece I wrote:

In September Radford branched out again with Bute Energy Ltd . . . in the electricity business, the production, transmission, distribution and trade of electricity to be exact.

What I didn’t know at the time was that the boys of Bute had all come from property company Parabola. And that the lead director of Bute, Oliver James Millican, is the son of Parabola boss, Peter John Millican.

The other Bute principals we’ve come to know are: Lawson Douglas Steele and Stuart Allan George. Barry Woods was a fourth departure from Parabola in November 2017. But Woods parted company with the others in September 2019.

Another name that crops up is John Reilly. Like those just named (apart from Millican) he has a company named ‘Windward’ followed by his initials. I can’t be sure if Reilly worked for Parabola, but he is now Project Manager for Bute. Like the others, he lives in Scotland.

These ‘personal’ companies all saw a massive boost in their values recently.

These figures might be accounted for by a payout from Grayling Capital LLP, which dissolved around that time. For Millican, Steele and George were Designated Members, and Reilly a Member. Another Member had been SuperSpAd and ‘Welsh’ Labour insider David James Taylor. (Mentioned a few times on this site.)

UPDATE: More plausibly, the windfall is explained here.

But that only throws up another question – where did the money come from that went into Grayling Capital?

Whatever the answer, that’s a lot of money for a group that has yet to put up a single turbine. Ask yourself, how does that ten grand for your village hall from a developer’s ‘community fund’ compare to sums like these?

Taylor also did well for himself. The clip below is from the accounts of Taylor’s company Moblake Ltd. A liquidator was appointed in April 2022 and Taylor rode off into the sunset with the 600k in his saddlebags.

The ultimate holding company for all the Bute entities is Windward Global Ltd. The sole director is Millican Jnr. The company was formed in May 2017 as DMWSL 864 Ltd and changed its name six months later, at the exact same time we are expected to believe the boss’s son and his mates turned their backs on Parabola.

Somehow, the Parabola-Bute crew made contact with Radford. Who joined Bute Energy Ltd in September 2018, less than a week after Oliver Millican. (The company changed its name to RSCO 3750 Ltd and folded in September 2023.)

How was this contact made? Why did Parabola turn its attention to wind turbines? And to Wales?

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PARABOLA-BUTE DISCOVERS WALES

But how did they ‘discover’ Wales? Were there introductions? To answer these questions I’ll begin with something substantive before flying a kite.

In the first piece, of November 2018, you’d have read a section – ‘Mystery Woman’ – in which I identified Anna McMorrin as a lobbyist for Hendy wind farm. She was then a Labour insider shacked up with a minister in the ‘Welsh Government’, and she went on to become the MP for Cardiff North in the June 2017 general election.

Seventeen months after McMorrin’s performance before Powys councillors, Steven Radford of Hendy wind farm teamed up with Parabola-Bute.

This pattern of Labour party involvement (ahem!) has been repeated in subsequent years. Most recently with Sophie Howe, former Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, who became a director of the new Bute Energy Ltd last month. (It switched names with RSCO 3750 Ltd.)

Labour party troughing is covered in many other posts on this site.

So we have the Labour party helping windfarm developers, but that doesn’t establish a connection for Radford with Millican and his pals. Yet people I’ve spoken with recently are convinced the key lies with Radford and Hendy Wind Farm Ltd.

And what a story of political corruption that was; done to help a project meet an OFGEN funding deadline, with one hurriedly erected turbine – that has never turned!

But even if Hendy is the key, that still doesn’t explain how Radford and the Bute gang met each other.

Here’s one possibility . . .

McMorrin was working for a company, Invicta Public Affairs, with branches in Glasgow and London, but its registered office is on the Gallowgate, not far from St James’ Park in Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

Parabola, despite having offices in Edinburgh and London, began life in Newcastle and still maintains a presence in a building it redeveloped near the Central Station.

I admit the Geordie connection is tenuous; yet while the Labour party link to both Radford and Bute is established, there is still no evidence it was the comrades who brought them together.

Though the Labour party is now so enmeshed with Parabola-Bute it might soon be difficult to disentangle them. What with individual party members involved and then the council pension fund investment. (Controlled by BlackRock.)

Plaid Cymru is also getting in on the climate scam. Sorry! that should read: saving the planet for future generations. In the form of an obscure Plaid loyalist from Ynys Môn named Carmen Smith.

After dabbling in student politics, working for politicos and leftist groups, Smith was given a made-up job with Bute in October 2023 – Advisor on Youth Governance! Her employer is named as Windward Global, the ultimate holding company for the Bute empire.

Next, she made it to the House of Lords when Plaid needed to replace retiring Lord Wigley. The election process was rigged in order to ignore members’ choice of former MP Elfyn Llwyd.

These shenanigans now give Bute a presence in the House of Lords.

◊

KLINGON AND A POSSIBLE RESTORATION TRAGEDY

As is often the case with planning permission – and perhaps especially in Wales – what is originally given consent is often very different to what is eventually built. ‘Changes’ and ‘modifications’ are made, which may or may not go through the planning process.

In the case of Bute Energy these now include, “bigger blades, higher substations, to cracking on before approval of any restoration plans. The local authorities, who told PEDW they have no resources to oversee any planning conditions, appear to be rubber stamping things“.

Never was rubber stamping more obvious than with this amendment submitted by Bute to Caerphilly council regarding Twyn Hywel wind farm. Fortunately, the council accepts correspondence in English, Welsh, and Klingon.

For it was indeed accepted.

In the quote I used just now you’ll have seen a reference to “restoration plans“. So let me explain what this is about.

After certain opencast mines came to the end of their working lives in southern Wales it was expected that the companies involved would – as promised – restore the sites to something close to their original state.

But, alas, when the time came for the restoration to begin – the companies involved had relocated to offshore tax havens.

In 2010, a company called Celtic Energy sold its opencast coalmines – with its restoration liabilities – for £1 apiece to a series of shell companies it had set up in the British Virgin Islands. Then the senior executives walked away with millions.

To avoid something similar happening with windfarms a number of people have submitted FoI requests to the ‘Welsh Government’ about site restoration, but I’ve yet to see a response that satisfies anyone.

UPDATE 02.10.2025: Here’s an example that I’ve just received from a reader. Natural Resources Wales says they can’t tell how much they demand for wind farm site restoration, because “this information is commercially sensitive“.

It’s now being suggested that wind turbines in Wales have an operational lifespan of 50 years. Below is a clip from Google AI, and here’s a link to a piece in Solar Power Portal which says, “Manmoel Wind will have an operational life span of 50 years“.

Obviously, no turbine lasts 50 years. A turbine is lucky to make 20, or 25. So people who’ve seen that 50 year figure assume the turbines will be replaced at some stage.

Yet the extended lifespan claim appears again in this response from Bute to a question from a concerned local resident:

Quite frankly, I believe that ten years from now few new (or replacement) turbines will be going up. People are no longer listening to the Swedish doom goblin and her Globalist masters. Reality is kicking in.

So the question remains: with the bubble soon to burst, why are turbines going up today, or tomorrow, being given operational lifespans of 40 or 50 years?

Could it be because developers have an arrangement with politicians and planners that restoration of a site begins when the agreed operational lifespan is up? Even if the turbines had long ago stopped working. Or had even been removed?

My belief is that restoration costs should be paid up front, before a single turbine is erected, and the money ring-fenced so politicians can’t get their grubby paws on it. Furthermore, the restoration costs must not be limited to the visual. There must be enough money deposited to pay for the removal and disposal of the vast concrete bases in which every turbine stands.

Questions need to be asked about this extended operational lifespan. And whether it will be linked with site restoration.

UPDATE 12.10.2025: I should add that being ‘imaginative’ with a project’s lifespan might encourage hesitant investors. And it will be used by politicians spouting ‘future generations’ bollocks to grant planning permission.

◊

THE PYLON RUNS

Clearly, the hundreds of wind turbines planned for remote upland areas of Wales are a long way from the eventual consumers in England. For that’s where it’s going. (Ignore bullshit like, “powering seven million Welsh homes“.)

Below you’ll see two maps that I hope will help explain the position.

On the left is a map produced by the ‘Welsh Government’ in its Future Wales The National Plan 2040 (update), showing the designated areas for wind power. On the right, a map produced by CPRW (here), adding areas for solar power and associated infrastructure including pylon routes.

Because, clearly, there will be a need for pylons and overhead power lines to run from the windfarms to where they can connect with the grid. Though in environmentally sensitive (or politically favoured) sections the cabling might be underground.

In the southern half of the country this means a run from around Aberedw, east of Llandrindod, down to Builth, and then down Dyffryn Tywi to Llandyfaelog, south of Carmarthen. The other southern line runs from the wild country east of Lampeter – projects I covered in this piece – following the Teifi before branching off south from somewhere near Llandysul.

In the northern section, the run starts near Llangurig, then runs north before turning north east to its destination at Lower Frankton in Shropshire. Though for some reason we were originally told it ended in ‘Chirk’.

Perhaps we were supposed to think it would supply Wrecsam and Deeside.

This simple map of the grid in Wales will also help as it shows most of the turbines planned are going up in areas a long way from that grid.

Most electricity in Wales is generated by Pembroke power station in the far south west. The line then runs east, supplying much of the urban south, before taking power over the border.

The loop in the north is, I suspect, accounted for by the decommissioned nuclear power stations at Wylfa and Trawsfynydd.

Let’s conclude this section by focusing on an area just mentioned, Twm Siôn Cati country. There’s a very active group opposing the three projects we’ve heard about (there may be more to come), and there was a public meeting last month.

Here’s a report from the Western Mail. Here in pdf format.

The meeting was held in Pumsaint because, as I explained in the piece I linked to earlier, the blades and turbines will need to be transported from Pumsaint up country, and over the 2,500 acres of the National Trust’s Dolaucothi estate.

For some reason the NT is coy about giving out information about its involvement with wind farm developers.

To add to the air of mystery, I’m informed that prior to the Pumsaint meeting local Plaid worthies met with Bute representatives at the Falcondale Hotel, just a mile or so north east of Lampeter. Is this true?

If so, what did they discuss? More peerages?

◊

ODDS AND ENDS

I’ve been writing about wind farms for so long, and more keep appearing, that I was almost on the point of giving up. But like I say, as truth dawns, and the costs mount, the bubble will eventually burst.

So I’ll stick with it, and give a few random thoughts. First, something that’s been a stone in my shoe for a while. Maybe someone out there can help.

It’s a company called Storagefolk Ltd. The sole director is Oliver Millican, and ownership traces back to super holding company Windward Global, where all the shares are owned by Millican.

Now, this company was formed September 2017; it seems to do nothing, yet it’s kept alive, so I must assume there’s a reason for its existence. But what?

Answers on a postcard . . .

Returning to electricity transmission . . . in a belated attempt to salvage its reputation the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ set up Trydan Gwyrdd Cymru. Which, to date, has achieved virtually nothing beyond virtue signalling.

And of course, costing us money.

Those clowns in Corruption Bay had over two decades to ensure that, if we had no alternative but to participate, that at least Wales benefitted from this climate scam. But they did nothing beyond pimping Wales out to any green con artists who slunk into view.

Bute has also set up a distribution company, Green Gen Cymru (GGC). Which is planning the pylon runs we looked at earlier. Though this is a joint venture with Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, a major funder for Bute.

The GCC chairman is Bleddyn Phillips, former chairman of London Welsh Rugby Club, who worked in Russia when his wife, Dame Anne Pringle, was ambassador.

For many year Phillips was Global Head of Oil and Gas for multinational lawyers Clifford Chance LLP. These are not the kind of lawyers you go to if Plod arrests you for hurty words on X. We are talking big, big money here. Billions.

Consequently, Phillips must know many wealthy investors in the energy field from his globetrotting days. I wonder if any of them are interested in Green Gen Cymru?

◊

CONCLUSION

I don’t wish to name groups or individuals, but I believe the fight against these various – but linked – plans is too fragmented. A certain level of unity is needed. Or at the very least, co-operation.

Yet it must also be kept local.

By which I mean, involve local people, farmers and others with a stake in the country. At all costs avoid creating the impression that the only people opposing wind turbines and pylons are well-heeled nimbys who’ve moved into the area.

Selfish buggers who are now, “denying locals thousands of well-paid jobs“.

Because that’s the kind of lie those opposing you – politicians and ‘developers’ – will use to divide and discredit you.

And finally, don’t trust political parties that support Net Zero, wind farms and all the rest. Politicians with constituencies or council areas threatened by the projects of Bute and others are in trouble, and they know it.

So they’re trying to ride two horses. But only succeeding in coming across as more two-faced than usual. It is not a pretty sight.

Say, “Thank you very much for your kind offer of advice and assistance” – then help them through the door. Whether you open the door is entirely up to you.

♦ end ♦

Future Generations Deserve Better Than Net Zero

On 02.01.202502.01.2025 By JacIn Abergavennyshire, Climate, Colonisation of Wales, Environmentalism, Greens, Gwlad, Labour Party, Wind Turbines20 Comments

There’s a gathering of envirogrifters on February 4 at the Pierhead Building in Corruption Bay. Here’s an invitation from Daniel Lock of Nature Service Wales, a newish outfit and local branch of the scarcely older Food, Farming & Countryside Commission (FFCC).

Reminding us that ‘environmentalism’ sees new groups spring up almost every day, proliferating like maggots on a corpse. That’s because ‘the environment’ nowadays is a great investment opportunity, just like the ‘climate emergency’. As a result, the toad-savers are now regularly rubbing shoulders with ‘investors’.

◊

DIFFICULT TO KEEP UP

As I suggest, its Welsh arm is new, and FFCC itself was officially formed in April 2020. Though it certainly existed before that date.

The guiding light seems to have been Sir Ian Michael Cheshire, chair of ‘green’ Land Securities Group. He left FFCC in July ’24.

Landsec is, according to Wikipedia, “the largest commercial property development and investment company in the United Kingdom“. Companies House can’t tell us who owns holding company Landsec Securities Group Plc, but the Financial Times throws up some familiar names, with two BlackRock companies jointly owning 10%.

But back to the Food, Farming & Countryside Commission.

If we trace back a little further we find that FFCC was incubated by the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA).

I know this because I came across it by a roundabout route – in the Linkedin profile of former Labour Assembly Member and minister Jane Davidson. From which the extracts below come.

This link between Jane Davidson and FFCC is confirmed by this page from the FFCC website. Which tells us that in September 2021:

After three years, Jane Davidson is stepping down as Chair of the Food, Farming and Countryside Commission’s Wales inquiry.

The link is further confirmed by this mention on the RSA website.

The article informs us Davidson was succeeded by another Corruption Bay insider in the form of Chris Nott, senior partner at Capital Law, one of the ‘Welsh Government’s favourite firms.

The sequence seems to be that Jane Davidson became a Fellow of the RSA at the start of 2014. Before the year is out she’s chair of the RSA’s Welsh Advisory Board. In November 2017 the RSA launched the FFCC. Then, Nature Service Wales was set up in the second half of 2023.

The suggested timeline is partly confirmed by this piece by Abergavennyshire ‘farmer’ Sue Pritchard. Who became chief executive of FFCC following her involvement in the RSA incubation period.

Her Linkedin profile also tells us she attended very expensive Atlantic College. Like the daughters of Stephen Kinnock, Labour MP for Aberavon. Whose wife, former Danish PM, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, is coining it from wind turbine going up all over Wales.

Davidson herself was privately educated at Malvern Girls’ College.

It don’t matter from which angle you come at it, you soon realise the proselytisers of the climate scam, and the ‘mass-extinction-around-the-corner’ crew, belong to the middle class going through one of its periodic fits of ‘Isn’t it ghastly!‘

∼

I shall return to the FFCC and the Wales Nature Service at a later date, but for now I’m going to concentrate on the ubiquitous and very influential Jane Davidson.

◊

JANE DAVIDSON AND FRIENDS

It’s amazing how many entries you can find when searching the internet for ‘Jane Davidson’. An interesting one I turned up is an event she attended last year organised by the School of International Futures (SOIF) which is:

a global non-profit transforming futures for current and next generations

But she wasn’t lonely. For also there was the former Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, Sophie Howe; and her successor in that post, another Labour stalwart in the form of Derek Walker.

So we had three Labour insiders on the same jolly.

SOIF is organising another get-together of the hand-wringers this year at Lainston House in Wiltshire. But it don’t come cheap . . .

I wonder who’ll be there from Wales.

Among the SOIF funders we find the UN, the WHO and – it should go without saying – George Soros’s Open Society Foundations. Fitting in a way, seeing as Davidson, Howe, and Walker, are all linked to Coleg Soros in Talgarth.

Where, among the funders, is the A Team Foundation. In its latest accounts this lot explains its donation thus:

Black Mountains college curriculum challenges the basis of our destructive economy.

Yeah, we gotta do away with this “destructive economy” . . . that’s provided us with homes, jobs, cars, cheap energy, regular holidays. Let’s swap it for a future in which the only jobs will be for Davidson, Howe and their friends telling us what we can’t have, and what we can’t do.

And they’ll be funded by those who’ve grown rich from dispossessing 99% of us – but it’ll all be done for our own good!

So look on the bright side . . .

Er, no; there isn’t one.

◊

WHO IS THE REAL JANE DAVIDSON?

If we refer back to her Linkedin page, we see nothing before 2000. That source begins with her appointment as Minister for Education, Lifelong Learning and Skills, after being elected to the Assembly in May 1999.

Though the important job was Minister of Environment, Sustainability and Housing 2007 – 2011. For the ‘environment’ is her true calling. Maybe her mission.

This BBC profile from September 1999 helps fill in some gaps. So let’s deal with the purely personal first. Not because I enjoy doing it but because Davidson has been so secretive about it. For example, never using her married name. Yet, thanks to the BBC, it’s in the public domain.

And the Beeb tells us she married Guy Roger George Stoate in January 1993. Stoate was a lecturer, and here he is in 2009 protesting at our Notional Assembly – where his wife was the Labour Member for Pontypridd!

I suppose that would be a good reason not to call yourself ‘Mrs Stoate’.

Since they moved west Guy has run a second-hand bookshop in Aberteifi, called Leafed Through. It’s a ‘community’ bookshop. Stoate and his bookshop are regularly in the local rags making donations to other ‘community’ groups.

(I can’t help thinking the Cambrian News missed a glorious opportunity there. Can’t you see the headline? – ‘Stoate gives monkey to badgers’.)

As luck would have it, Tom Kearney of the Ceredigion Badger Group was also in the Labour party . . . ’til last month, when he resigned over Starmer not being socialist enough. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, the Labour party in rural Wales is almost entirely made up of middle class English interferers, more alien than the Tories ever were.

With too many of them running ‘community’ ventures in Welsh communities they know sod all about. Driven by the same belief in their superior organisational abilities that helped build the empire they now repudiate.

But back to Mrs Stoate.

Look again at the BBC profile and let me direct you to the gap from 1996 until the first Assembly elections in May 1999. Was she working her Ponty constituency, even before Labour won the May ’97 general election and confirmed we’d be offered devolution?

If not, then what was she doing? Answers . . . post card . . .

But the bigger question is, when did she become the scheming zealot we see now, involved in everything; the ambassador for Agenda 2030 and the climate scam?

It may have begun when she attended the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, where she claims to have experienced a “damascene moment“, according to this piece from the Sustainable Brands (SB) website (scroll down) following a 2017 conference in Copenhagen.

That article is interesting for two main reasons.

It tells us Jane Davidson bought into the climate scam over three decades ago.

But she had to be in Rio for the ‘conversion’ to happen. So why was she there? Because at the time – according to her BBC profile – she was working as a researcher for the late Rhodri Morgan, then Labour MP for Cardiff West.

Surely Rhodri Morgan didn’t send her? I can’t see that, especially as the House of Commons was sitting from 2 June 1992 to 16 July 1992 inclusive.

So why was she in Rio? And who paid for the trip? Again, answers . . . post card . . .

◊

CONCLUSION & RECOMMENDATION

I don’t necessarily trust Wikipedia, but here’s what it says about Jane Davidson.

She was minister for environment and sustainability in Wales from 2007 to 2011 where she was responsible for the agreeing to make sustainable development its central organising principle

And yet, “sustainable development” has such a positive ring to it. Surely, only a maniac intent on destroying the planet would not want it?

Well, yes; that’s how they want us to see it.

The problems come, first, with the realisation that the ‘danger’ the planet is facing is greatly exaggerated if not entirely imaginary, and the measures demanded to mitigate a manageable or non-existent threat are destroying economies and the lives of hundreds of millions of people.

And for reasons the zealots prefer not to discuss, it’s the West that’s suffering.

But the damage didn’t end when Davidson left the Assembly in 2011. For the SB article we looked at earlier tells us Davidson confesses to having written The Wellbeing of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015.

As a Google AI overview puts it:

The Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 was a key starting point for Wales’s efforts to reduce its carbon emissions and transition to a net zero economy

Even though it wasn’t really the “starting point“, this legislation means that everything done in Wales must accord with the diktats of UN Agenda 2030.

Every economy-killing, cost-raising, poverty-increasing lunacy.

I am delighted to report that the party to which I belong is serious about repealing this legislation.

Davidson’s influence on political decision making didn’t end when she left the Assembly, nor with the passing of the Future Generations legislation. Because she never really left; she’s always there, sitting on this board, chairing that panel.

Giving her more political clout than anybody you’ve ever voted for.

One such position is chair of the Wales Net Zero 2035 Challenge Group. An unsavoury crew of bought academics, enviroshysters, assorted grifters, and fraudsters who might be banged up if they weren’t selling their duff products on behalf of ‘the planet‘.

The ‘findings’ of this crew will be even more damaging for Wales than what’s gone before. But we can’t afford any more of it.

If the wreckage of the Welsh economy and the collapse of our public services was treated as a crime scene, then Jane Davidson’s fingerprints would be everywhere. Which is why I consider her to be the most dangerous individual in the disaster that devolution has proved to be.

I say that because incompetence and stupidity are one thing (and found everywhere in devolved Wales), but what Davidson and her kind are doing is a deliberate and calculated attempt to de-industrialise and impoverish Wales in order to showcase our self-destruction to the rest of the world.

And so I say, Agenda 2030 and Net Zero must be rejected if our people are to have decent jobs; if they are to live in homes they were able to buy; in a country where public services work; where food is plentiful, cheap, and we aren’t told what we can eat.

This is the Wales we should demand for our children. Not the dystopian vision being offered by ‘environmentalists’, and used to enrich their corporate backers.

♦ end ♦

Parabola Bute Energy, Scottish Echoes

On 05.08.202406.08.2024 By JacIn Colonialism, Corruption, Welsh Government, Welsh Labour, Wind Turbines38 Comments

This piece has been prompted by information received from Scotland, which may clear up a lingering mystery, while also telling us more about the operations of those involved with Parabola Bute Energy.

I use that name because I’m convinced that Bute Energy, which wants to build some 20 wind farms in Wales, plus other installations, also mile after mile of pylons, is little more than a venture into the renewables sector by property group Parabola.

I say that because the ultimate holding company for all Bute companies is Windward Global Ltd. This company is controlled by Oliver James Millican. He is the son of Peter John Millican, who runs Parabola.

The son worked for the father at Parabola, as did the other Bute principals (though some have since left Bute). They all ‘departed’ Parabola late in 2017 or early in 2018.

But to avoid confusion, I’ll stick to the name you’ve become familiar with.

◊

NEWS FROM THE NORTH

I’ve written a lot about ‘Bute Energy’, in its various incarnations, but always from a Welsh perspective. And despite consistently identifying it as a Scottish company, I’ve never really looked into what Bute’s owners might have got up to in Scotland.

So let’s put that right. Starting with a warehouse, a very big warehouse, over 122,000 sq ft; it’s to the east of Glasgow, not far off the M8, which runs to Edinburgh.

It was reported on October 2, 2018 that the Titan warehouse had been bought for £6.5M by Grayling Capital. This is Grayling Capital LLP, formed just over a year earlier.

If we turn to the Members of this LLP, we see the names of Oliver James Millican, Stuart Allan George, and Lawson Douglas Steele. These are the names we’ve become familiar with as they keep turning up as directors of the Bute companies in Wales.

At the bottom of the list we see David James Taylor, a Labour insider in Wales whose name has cropped up a few times in the Bute saga.

The warehouse had been used by Lidl, but the company decided to move out to a purpose-built warehouse of their own. So Grayling looked around for a buyer. They didn’t find one, but the Covid pandemic did provide a tenant, in the form of the Scottish government. Or rather, the Scottish NHS.

The lease runs to 31 January 2031, at £766,094 per annum. Which was a good bit of business for Grayling, but it got better. For in March 2021 the warehouse was sold for £14.326m to the Lothian Pension Fund. Ultimately owned by the City of Edinburgh Council.

Though I ask myself, why did Lothian Pension Fund pay £14.3m for a property it must have known sold for half that price just over two years earlier? Did the Auditor General get involved?

Grayling Capital LLP is now liquidated.

In the report I just linked to you’ll see the sale worded thus:

The Lothian Pension Fund has acquired a prime logistics warehouse at Eurocentral in North Lanarkshire from Windward Titan.

Windward Titan was a vehicle set up specifically for the warehouse deal in Scotland, and that explains why it hasn’t been mentioned on this blog. Though ‘Windward’ should certainly be familiar to regular readers. It crops up with a number of other companies.

Windward Titan is now dissolved.

The directors were of course Millican, Steele, and George. Control was exercised by Windward Enterprises Ltd, which is now – since St David’s Day this year – known as Windward Energy Ltd. Which is in turn owned by the company mentioned above as the ultimate holding company, Windward Global Ltd.

Here’s the warehouse disappearing from the Windward Titan balance sheet.

You’ll see that the warehouse was valued at just over £7 million. It sold for £14.3 million. And on top of that there’s the income of £766,000 a year from the Scottish NHS until 2031. Did that lease transfer to the new owner?

What’s more, a Scottish source tells me that the value of the warehouse was increased because as part of the lease the Scottish government agreed to undertake improvements costing £2.75m.

Bizarrely, this work meant that the warehouse could not be used at the height of the pandemic – which was the reason for taking out the lease in the first place!

One reason I find this story from Scotland so interesting is that it seems to presage what we’ve seen in Wales. More on this later.

Another reason is that those involved in the warehouse deal are now in Wales posing as planet savers, but they are first and foremost property speculators.

Never, ever, forget that.

◊

WHO FILLED THEIR BOOTS, AND HOW?

Windward Titan was started with a single £1 share and there was never any money in the kitty, just the value of the warehouse. The only cash money appeared at the end, from the parent company, to settle up with the liquidators.

So to follow the money we need to turn to Grayling Capital LLP.

A LLP is a Limited Liability Partnership, popular with solicitors, accountants, and other professionals working as a partnership. When used in a more commercial context it can disguise ‘opaque’ dealings.

What you see below is from the final page of Windward Titan’s financial statement for year ending 31.03.2020.

It tells that the Titan warehouse was bought by Windward Titan with a loan from parent company Windward Enterprises Ltd. And it also confirms that everything is ultimately owned by Windward Global Ltd and Oliver James Millican.

To return to Labour insider David James Taylor. Who’d been Spad to Peter Hain MP and Welsh first ministers Rhodri Morgan and Carwyn Jones. More specifically, to the money given to his company Moblake Ltd (originally Moblake Wind Ventures Ltd).

From Moblake Ltd financial statement for y/e 31.03.2021. Click to open enlarged in separate tab

There were two possible sources for the ‘interest free loan’ of £605,872 Taylor made to himself. Both linked to Bute.

One was his shares in Windward Energy Ltd (formerly Windward Enterprises Ltd), but he held these shares until July 22, 2022. Whereas the mysterious £600,000+ had been and gone from Moblake at least a year earlier.

The answer would seem to be Taylor being a Member of Grayling Capital LLP. He ceased being a Member September 13, 2021, which ties in with the sale of the Titan warehouse in March of that year to the Lothian Pension Fund.

The question then becomes . . . why was Taylor, living either in Wales or London, involved with a Scottish company doing business in Scotland?

I think the answer may lie in the timing. Taylor joined Grayling Capital in September 2019, a year after the Bute boys seem to have found their way to Wales. They hired him to open doors in Corruption Bay and elsewhere.

So let’s look at what happened. And how I think it was done.

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BUTE COMES TO WALES

Now we’re going to look at how a clearly Scottish company manoeuvred itself into such a dominant position in Wales. But it could only have been done with the help of the Labour party.

On this blog, I first mentioned Bute Energy in November 2018, in Corruption in the wind?. But only tangentially. For I was really writing about a guy named Radford, who wanted to build three wind farms; two in Powys, the other in Pembrokeshire.

One of his projects, Hendy, near Llandrindod, was turned down by a planning inspector, but that decision was surprisingly overturned by Lesley Griffiths, who was at the time Energy, Planning and Rural Affairs Secretary in Corruption Bay.

To do that was strange enough. But it stank even more when it became clear that Griffiths did it just in time for the developer to erect a single turbine (never connected to the grid), in order to meet the Ofgem payment deadline on January 31, 2019.

Those involved even seemed to know about Griffiths’ decision in advance, to the extent of jumping the gun.

Here’s a recent update on Hendy from the CPRW.

Why did Lesley Griffiths give permission for a wind farm that was never going to be built? The answer is a 10-letter word beginning with ‘c’.

As I say, the guy involved was Steven John Radford, of Hendy Wind Farm Ltd. But he was only fronting for a big company called U+I.

The reason Bute got a mention was, and here I quote from that November 2018 piece:

In September Radford branched out again with Bute Energy Ltd, joining six days after its two founding directors.

Those two directors were Millican and Steele, who we’ve already met. Radford may have been their introduction to Wales. (Bute Energy Ltd was re-named RSCO 3750 Ltd in March 2020.)

Or maybe the key lies with whoever introduced them to each other. So let’s fit a few things into that time-frame.

Radford was already planning wind farms, and lobbying for him was Invicta Public Affairs of Newcastle. Invicta’s representative in Wales since October 2016 had been Labour Spad Anna McMorrin, now MP for Cardiff North.

The Bute Boys linked up with Radford, and Taylor might have taken over McMorrin’s role providing a link between developers and Labour party. A different Scottish source told me last year that Taylor has now been replaced by Sophie Howe, the former Future Generations Commissioner.

Here’s a table I drew up of some essential facts, with links. You might find it useful.

Among those who get a mention in the table are the four below. Vaughan is a former Labour MEP, and Uden is the husband of Labour MS Jenny Rathbone. For some reason you won’t find the panel below on the Bute website any longer.

And even though McMorrin never seemed to work for Bute before becoming an MP in June 2017, she nevertheless declared £3,000 received from Bute earlier this year.

Throughout this story I’ve been struck by how often Newcastle crops up. It’s the city where Parabola began life. ‘Bute’ companies have used Newcastle addresses. And Invicta, the lobbyist we encountered with Anna McMorrin, is also based there.

And there are a number of Parabola outfits using a Newcastle address.

But Invicta also has an office in Edinburgh, the city where we usually find Millican Jr, Steele, and George.

Something else worth remembering is that Lesley Griffiths and David Taylor know each other. They’re from the same area, here’s a photo of Taylor canvassing for Griffiths. Both had been involved in the Carl Sargeant tragedy.

What we looked at earlier in Scotland seems to be repeated to some degree with what we’ve seen in Wales.

On the one hand, we saw Millican and his mates do a lucrative deal with the Scottish Government. Here, Bute Energy has been adopted by the so-called ‘Welsh Government’.

In Scotland, a local government pension fund stepped in to buy Titan Warehouse for perhaps double what it was worth. Here there’s been a big investment from the Wales Pension Partnership. With some councils unhappy with the decision.

Is this all coincidence?

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WHAT NEXT?

Something worth remembering about Bute is that for all the companies, and all the wind farm projects, Bute has never erected a single bloody turbine. Perhaps because those involved are property speculators.

Which is why some people – and I’ve been one of them – think that Bute is not here to actually build wind farms. Maybe they’re just here to get exclusivity agreements with landowners and planning permissions.

Then sell up, making massive profits, without having done much other than smooch Labour politicians and sponsor Cwmscwt Annual Ferret Show.

But because there are now so many wind farm projects planned in Wales it can only be a matter of time before we see developers fighting turf wars. Maybe it’s started.

Take the case of Foel Fach and Orddu, just north of Bala.

Foel Fach Wind Farm Ltd, the company, was set up May 31, 2022. Head honcho is David Charles Murray. Orddu is a Bute project, the company formed a year later.

Murray got a mention on this blog back in October 2020 in, ‘Poor Wales: magnet for property spivs, fraudsters, and enviroshysters‘. I mentioned him due to his connection with the project between Port Talbot and Maesteg known as Y Bryn.

But Murray has been involved with many wind farm projects, and his main vehicle seems to be Coriolis Energy Ltd. It has a very basic website, and here’s the Companies House filing. Coriolis Energy is owned by Coriolis Energy Developments LLP. But again, that’s David Charles Murray.

Y Bryn Wind Farm Ltd shares a Berkshire address with Coriolis.

When we look at who’s behind Foel Fach, we see again Coriolis Energy Developments LLP and David Charles Murray.

The map on the left shows the relative positions of the Foel Fach and Orddu summits. The map on the right gives the outline of the Foel Fach wind farm.

But this is where it gets a bit messy.

For a start, I can’t find a map for Orddu, so where will it end and Foel Fach begin? Are they contiguous? Do they overlap? Or are they two names for what will be one big site?

We’ve always been told there must be a ‘buffer zone’ between wind farms and National Parks. But Foel Fach runs right up to the Eryri boundary on the B4501. Who allowed this?

Incidentally, the ‘lake’ to the left on that map is the Tryweryn reservoir covering Capel Celyn. And Foel Fach wind farm will also overlook Frongoch, where Irish prisoners were interned after 1916.

And finally . . . I believe David Charles Murray of Coriolis is Scottish. Many of his other projects have been in Scotland. So are he and the Bute boys acquainted?

Wind farm developments in Wales are out of control, it’s a free-for-all. Planning permission guaranteed; no matter how ugly, inappropriate, or damaging the project. Wales already has too many wind farms (and too many pylons), we don’t need any more.

And because it appears we’re in this mess due to questionable links between wind farm developers and the Labour party, a thorough and impartial examination of such links is surely the best way to proceed.

Being the transparent and co-operative organisation it is, and with nothing to hide, I’m sure the Labour party will agree.

♦ end ♦

Coleg Soros And Associates

On 18.06.202418.06.2024 By JacIn Colonialism, Corruption, Environmentalism, Globalism, Labour Party, Welsh Government, Wind Turbines, World Economic Forum19 Comments

This wasn’t planned, but it’s too big and complicated for a tweet, and so I’m putting it out as a quickie. As the title suggests, it concerns Coleg Soros in Talgarth, otherwise known as Black Mountains College.

For those new to this blog, or regulars with short memories, I have written a few times about Coleg Soros, so just type the name in the search box to the right. This piece from June 2019 will explain why I’ve renamed Black Mountains College after that evil old bastard (scroll down).

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COLEG SOROS GROWS!

Over the years I’ve become aware of two Coleg Soros entities: the now dissolved Black Mountains College Ltd, and Black Mountains College Project Ltd.

But there was a third company I’d somehow overlooked. In my defence I’ll say that this other company wasn’t launched until just before Christmas 2022. It’s Black Mountains College Operations Ltd. Scroll down on the overview page and you’ll see that it’s devoted to education.

It began life with a single £1 share held by director Ben Rawlence, who’s been involved with Coleg Soros from the off. But then things moved on apace.

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INTEREST FROM AFAR

In June 2023 there was a share issue with a total value of £4,480,000. A couple of weeks later, William John Lana became a director. In November 2023 the company produced a breakdown of shareholders. Here it is.

Like me when I first saw it, you’re wondering about Rewilding Wealth Ltd. So here’s what I found. It’s registered with Companies House as an Overseas Entity. Located in that bastion of probity and openness, the British Virgin Islands.

But using a Hong Kong correspondence address.

When we seek the beneficial owner(s) we see named, Andrew James Kadoorie McAulay, of Hong Kong, and the Bermuda Trust Company Ltd based, as you’d expect, on the sun-drenched isles of the same name.

Trying to make sense of it I wondered who McAulay is. What I found interesting is the Kadoorie element of his name. Because the Kadoories were a family of Jewish merchants in Baghdad who moved to China. And became very, very rich.

◊

AND CLOSER TO HOME

William John Lana, who we met earlier, may be the UK representative of Rewilding Wealth Ltd (RWL). I’m guessing that because in the Articles of Association for Black Mountains College Operations Ltd (page 12), it says:

For so long as RWL holds any shares in issue from time to time, it shall be entitled to nominate, appoint and maintain in office one person as a director of the company and to remove (or remove and replace) such director from time to time.

So what do we know about William John Lana? Well, let’s start with his Linkedin page, which mentions a number of companies he’s involved with. Partly confirmed by this Companies House entry.

But no mention of the one run by him and his wife, Greenfibres Ltd. It’s one of those companies that charges Guardian readers over the odds for linen and suchlike so they can sleep easy at night knowing they’re superior to the common herd destroying the planet.

Though I did find Greenfibres listed separately.

◊

MAKING SENSE OF IT

I think the key here is Rewilding Wealth Ltd. For while there is a Caribbean connection, I believe the majority holding lies in Hong Kong, with Andrew James Kadoorie McAulay.

As I’ve told you, his mother is a member of the ultra-wealthy Kadoorie clan, and his father, Ronald James McAulay, is a Scottish-Hong Kong billionaire, now in his late 80s.

Apart from McAulay Jnr being chairman of Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden, it’s difficult to know how he whiles away the hours, or how he makes his contribution to the family pile.

Hong Kong was handed over to the People’s Republic of China at midnight on July 1, 1997, and Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden was quick off the mark. For Wikipedia tells us, ‘Conservation work has been extended to Mainland China since 1998’.

‘Lo, all our pomp of yesterday Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!’ Click to open enlarged in separate tab

In fact, digging around, it became clear that McAulay works quite happily with communist China. It looks as if he and his family are ‘flexible’ in dealing with the comrades, and have been for some time.

An example might be him sitting on the board of the China Light and Power Company (CLP) from 1997 to 2000. Which coincides with his time as a director of UK-based Solar Century Holdings Ltd, now owned by Norwegian state-owned Statkraft.

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SOPHIE GETS IN ON THE ACT

Clearly, someone has plans that involve Wales, but will probably have little or no Welsh input. (Rather like Coleg Soros itself.) Other than the necessary permissions to go ahead. But why is whoever’s behind it all using a small education establishment in Powys?

To make sense of it, let me first make clear that Black Mountains College Operations Ltd is controlled by Black Mountains College Project Ltd.

Within days of William Lana becoming a director of the new creation, Sophie Joyce Howe joined the board of the parent company.

She is of course the former Future Generations Commissioner. Her Linkedin profile claims she’s now a ‘freelance’. Which may be true, but she’s not averse to picking up a few well-paid gigs on the side.

Because a good source told me Howe’s another of the many Labour insiders on the payroll of Scottish company Bute Energy, which wants to cover our beautiful country in wind turbines and pylons.

And then, when I checked the Charity Commission entry for Black Mountains College Project I could see that Sophie Howe is also a trustee of the Wellbeing Economy Alliance. She joined in July 2023.

And let’s not forget that in the extract I used from the Articles of Association of Black Mountains College Operations, and the reference to appointing a director, Howe might also fit the bill if the clause extends to the controlling company.

But if she is the designated RWL director, then who is Lana representing?

◊

WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?

Rewilding Wealth Ltd may do what it says on the tin, by which I mean it seeks investors for rewilding projects. And as the Guardian told us a few years back, there’s serious money to be made.

In which case, Coleg Soros will serve as the entry point, perhaps facilitator, for foreign investors buying up Welsh farmland. Something the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ fully supports, and which might explain Sophie Howe’s involvement.

Another possibility, is that Kadoorie-McAulay is fronting for the Chinese Communist Party, and they want their slice of the Welsh renewables cake. For in its blind acceptance of the Globalists’ climate scam the ‘Welsh Government’ has laid our country wide open to exploiters from around the world.

Neither corporate rewilders nor Chinese Communist party should be acceptable to any Welsh man or Welsh woman who cares about this little country of ours. It’s all we’ve got.

Something else that is unacceptable is the way Labour insiders benefit from cwtshing up to those exploiting Wales. Selling political influence for personal gain is exactly what Labour politicians accuse their Conservative counterparts of doing.

Deluding yourselves that taking the money is justified because you’re saving the planet is rank hypocrisy. Which is of course Labour’s stock-in-trade.

♦ end ♦

Climate Cult Killing The Welsh Family Farm

On 04.03.202405.03.2024 By JacIn Brexit, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption Bay, Environmentalism, EU Funding, Farming, Globalism, Hippies, Public Funding, Third Sector, Welsh Labour, World Economic Forum37 Comments

In this piece I’ll explain that the ‘Welsh Government”s Sustainable Farming Scheme (SFS) is just the latest in a long series of attacks on the Welsh family farm, and all that that means.

The SFS demands that 10% of every farm be given over to trees, with a further 10% to ‘habitat’. Many farms will become unprofitable. Which is the whole point of the SFS – to release more land for other uses.

Today’s piece is bigger than others I’ve put out recently, some 3,400 words; but it’s broken up into sections, so take it a chunk at a time.

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2008: ONE WALES: ONE PLANET

I’ve chosen to start in May 2008 with the publication One Wales: One Planet. Sub-titled, ‘The Sustainable Development Scheme of the Welsh Assembly Government’. You’ll find a revealing extract below.

Let’s look at the first bullet point. Who decides Wales’s “environmental limits“? Who calculates our “fair share of the Earth’s resources“? Who measures our “ecological footprint“? (I’m a size 9.) And how can anyone work out, “the global average availability of resources“.

This is the kind of gobbledegook you can only get away with when you live a very sheltered life, mixing only with others in your bubble.

The final paragraph (below, my emphasis) leaves us in no doubt that everything that’s done in Wales from now on will be predicated on the belief that human beings are killing the planet.

To achieve this, sustainable development (the process that leads to Wales becoming a sustainable nation) will be the central organising principle of the Welsh Assembly Government, and we will encourage and enable others to embrace sustainable development as their central organising principle.

But as I’ve explained, there’s something more sinister behind it all. Which is not to say that those pushing the nonsense don’t believe it, I’m sure many of them do. But there are also many who go along with it because it’s become the accepted wisdom of the circles in which they mix.

Before I forget, chapter 8 is headed: ‘The Wellbeing of Wales’. (Now there’s a clue!)

The administration at the time was a Labour-Plaid Cymru coalition, and to jog your memory, here’s a cabinet group photo. The minister for environment and sustainability was Jane Davidson.

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2010: TECHNICAL ADVICE NOTE 6, ONE PLANET DEVELOPMENTS

July of 2010 brought joy unbounded with the announcement that hippy encampments, thrown up illegally (but with a nod and a wink from Corruption Bay), were now to be legitimised

Making TAN 6 little more than a general amnesty, or granting retrospective planning approval.

Dressed up as ‘sustainable living’, ‘self-sufficiency’, and God knows what else, they were in reality just a way around planning regulations for hippies and others to build ugly shacks in open country.

There were conditions attached, of course, not least, being able to prove that these impositions were to some degree self-sufficient . . . but nobody ever checks.

Interestingly, OPDs came to the notice of the World Economic Forum, which exposed the fundamental contradiction by urging people to move to Wales.

For OPDs were justified by arguing they’d reduce Wales’ carbon footprint. But this could only happen if local people moved out of traditional dwellings into OPD shacks. That never happened.

Instead, people moved from England to previously unused land . . . where they kept farting animals, burned wood, and drove old diesel vehicles; so that by these and other means increased Wales’ carbon footprint.

In a recent publication I noticed that DEI had been added to the chicken entrails in the voodoo stew. This news came from Sophie Howe herself, just before she stepped down as Future Generations Commission in 2022:

I am pleased to see the emphasis given to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, a key component of sustainability . . .

But despite the posturing, OPDs remain exclusively English, White, middle class.

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2011 OCTOBER: ALUN DAVIES AND ORGANIC ARABLE FARMING

Then there was the plan to help farmers go organic.

Alun Davies, deputy minister of agriculture, announced that priority would be given to arable farmers, and those converting to arable farming . . . in a country where climate and topography dictate that livestock farming will dominate.

But let’s not be picky, for I’m sure this news was welcomed in the pomegranate groves of Pembrokeshire and the broccoli orchards enhancing the Vale of Clwyd, but it offered sod all to most Welsh farmers.

This initiative might reveal the growing vegan influence. For these had been brought in from the fringes to serve the Globalists’ plan to eliminate livestock farming and take control of the land and the food supply.

◊

2013 DECEMBER: ALUN DAVIES AND HIS TWO-PILLAR TRICK

The above date was when Alun Davies, now farm minister, announced that funding from the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) Pillar 1 (direct payment to farmers) would be moved to Pillar 2 (‘other rural activities’).

Davies could have transferred anything up to 15%. Almost inevitably, he opted for the full whack. Defending the decision by saying Pillar 1 should not be seen as a “never-ending subsidy“.

To understand Alun Davies, and the socialist attitude to farming, here’s an outburst from him in October 2014.

The former minister in the Labour ‘Welsh Assembly Government’ (for he was sacked in July 2014) rails against ‘subsidies’; yet his administration had built up a vast third sector of cronies – all living off public funding!

And things have got worse, for now the ‘Welsh Government’ throws millions of pounds at Sustrans, Stonewall, wildlife trusts, and other pressure groups.

Clearly, in the eyes of Labour politicians there’s nothing wrong with subsidies per se, it all depends who’s getting them.

UPDATE 05.03.2024: But has Alun Davies recanted?

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2015: WELL-BEING OF FUTURE GENERATIONS (WALES) ACT

This legislation was a long time in the planning, but we know who wrote it.

For this article from Sustainable Brands (scroll down) tells us it was Jane Davidson, who we met earlier as the minister for environment and sustainability in the 2007 – 2011 Labour-Plaid Cymru coalition.

The article also says Davidson, ” . . . had her damascene moment at the Earth Summit in Rio in 1992“. But I don’t buy that.

For at the time she was a researcher for Labour MP for Cardiff West, Rhodri Morgan, who of course went on to become first minister of the Assembly. So was she representing him, or the Labour party, at Rio?

I think she’d already had her ‘damascene moment’, and she was there as one of the converted.

When she became Assembly Member for Pontypridd in 1999 Ponty was her ticket to more power and influence to push the anthropogenic global warming (AGW) narrative.

Which she did relentlessly and effectively.

And even though she stepped down as an AM in 2011 she never really left. For she was always in the shadows, nudging, hectoring, demanding. Now she chairs the ‘Welsh Government’s Wales Net Zero 2035 Challenge Group.

The significance of the Well-being Act is that, as was hinted in One Wales: One Planet in 2008, all other considerations must be subordinated to fighting the so-called ‘climate crisis’.

And this being the socialist hell that is Wales, the Act introduced yet more pointless bureaucracy and more opportunities for virtue signalling, with Public Services Boards for each of our 22 local authorities. (Yes, that’s right, 22 local authorities for a country of 3.2 million people.)

Perhaps the real lesson Wales could teach the world is how to bring a country to its knees. For this is the Globalist plan for the West.

The politicians and their pet parasites who achieved this resent giving money to farmers and others, who actually work, and produce necessities.

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2016 SEPTEMBER: START OF NVZ ‘CONSULTATION’

A Nitrate Vulnerable Zone (NVZ) is, according to the ‘Welsh Government’, “an area of land draining into ground or surface waters that are currently high in nitrate, or may become so if appropriate actions are not taken“.

It had always been accepted there was a problem, but it had also been understood that the problem was very localised, and seemed to be associated with dairy cattle.

Ostensibly to get a better understanding of the situation, the ‘Welsh Government’ launched a consultation process in September 2016.

The map above, produced by Natural Resources Wales (NRW), shows that Water Framework Directive (WFD) catchment areas covering some 90% of the country reported 0 – 4 incidents in the period 01.01.2010 to 01.01.2016.

The problem was clearly very localised.

Which is why NRW suggested increasing the area covered by NVZ legislation from 2.4% (750 farm holdings) to 8%. But, and here I quote from:

The (now) Minister for Environment, Energy and Rural Affairs, Lesley Griffiths, responded to the consultation replies a year later, in December 2017. She said she was “minded to introduce a whole Wales approach”.

Truth is, that had been the plan all along.

As an example of politicians going out of their way to make life more difficult for farmers – because of course there would be more expense and increased form-filling – the handling of NVZ legislation would be difficult to surpass.

This is how NFU Cymru described it:

As things stand, the ‘Welsh Government’ has been forced to be marginally less vindictive. With slightly less punitive measures being introduced in stages, the next due in August.

NVZ was part of a wider campaign to blame farmers for all pollution. To the extent of bribing river groups and other ‘environmentalists’. Done to protect the bigger culprit, Dŵr Cymru Welsh Water.

◊

2018 JULY: ‘BREXIT AND OUR LAND’

Wales voted to leave the European Union 23 June 2016.

That is, the people voted to leave. The political class was outraged at the stupidity of the hoi polloi. The media agreed. While the ever-multiplying legions of third sector parasites were aghast at the thought of losing such a lucrative funding stream.

In response the ‘Welsh Government’ produced ‘Brexit and our Land‘. Wherein we read (page 3) what was to replace the CAP.

But how can it talk of “food production” when we know Labour’s attitude towards farmers? While the reference to timber did not mean developing a genuine timber industry, it referred to what I’m now going to highlight.

Idly flicking through the annual accounts of Stoke engineering firm Goodwin Plc the other night I found this, on page 17.

The site of this enviro-colonialism is north west of Llanwrtyd. But it’s happening all over Wales.

This is how it works: Land is bought and trees are planted by investors like Goodwin, who will own the land, the trees, and the carbon they capture. This carbon can not be included in Wales’ carbon inventory.

Which means that outside investors could buy up 50% of Welsh land, make billions from carbon capture, none of which would contribute to Wales’ national figure (or economy) – and the ‘Welsh Government’ would pay them to do it!

The rest of rural Wales, and the post-industrial areas, will be surrendered to foreign-owned wind farms whose owners will dole out beads and blankets to the desperate inhabitants of doomed communities.

And it’s all built on a scam, for carbon is no threat to the environment.

As for “Public Goods“, this is a phrase picked up from the bad company Welsh politicians keep. It can mean whatever the person using it wants it to mean.

Just think of it as bollocks; usually delivered in Estuary English.

◊

2018 AUGUST: SUMMIT TO SEA

This project links with Brexit, and the publication you read about in the previous section. It’s ‘environmentalists’ seeking to capitalise on the new reality to grab a huge swathe of Welsh land.

The project began before the date I’ve just given, but I used that date because it’s the first time I mentioned the project on this blog. Click here and scroll down to the section ‘Re-wilding’.

In essence, a number of individuals and organisations came together and hatched a plan to requisition 10,000 hectares, from Pumlumon up to the Dyfi estuary, and out to sea for a few miles.

Below you’ll see two maps. The one on the left was produced by those behind the project; the one on the right tells us who’s really behind it. But I’m not sure who produced the second.

Admittedly, this was not a ‘Welsh Government’ policy . . . but I believe those involved had discussions with politicians and civil servants, and had been assured that Brexit could be the excuse used to withhold or ‘redirect’ farm subsidies.

Those involved were so confident of success, so arrogant, that they saw no need to engage with those whose land they wanted to appropriate. For it was a done deal.

Among the partners with Rewilding Britain was the Woodland Trust (WT). Here is Natalie Buttriss of the WT being interviewed on BBC Radio 4’s Farming Today in October 2018. And she plays the admonishing memsahib for all she’s worth.

Summit to Sea met its Waterloo at a public meeting in Talybont, north of Aberystwyth on 31 July 2019, when locals made their feelings unmistakably clear to even the thick-skinned individuals involved.

Partners such as Ecodyfi and Rewilding Britain soon withdrew, and the project was then taken over by the RSPB. The organisation that cares so much for birds, but has no issue with bird-killing wind turbines. (I wonder how much that silence costs.)

The Woodland Trust is still taking over Welsh land to plant trees and profit from the carbon capture scam you read about earlier. But all done of course to save the planet.

Summit to Sea was an attempt by ‘environmentalists’ and ‘conservationists’ to grab Welsh farmland using the threat of subsidy withdrawal. So it’s no surprise to learn that many see the Sustainable Farming Scheme as Summit to Sea repackaged.

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LATE 2018: TIT-BITS

In September, Lesley Griffiths, Cabinet Secretary for Energy, Planning and Rural Affairs, was in Frisco, at a UN bunfight giving business leaders a chance to impress politicians from the sub-national level.

What could possibly go wrong?

Griffiths came back, her rechargeable batteries humming, and a week or so after her return delivered this speech.

∼

A month later the Daily Post produced this article in which farmers accused wildlife groups of lying about bio-diversity loss in order to grab farm funding. I include it because it introduces an important new tactic into the ‘Welsh Government’s war on farmers.

Hoping to hide the source of the attacks the Corruption Bay establishment was now funding wildlife trusts and other groups to do the dirty work. I wrote about this just last month, in Wildlife Trusts, Crazy Money, Hidden Agendas.

Quoted in the DP article was Katie-Jo Luxton of the RSPB:

Writing in today’s Daily Post, RSPB Cymru director Katie-jo Luxton said it was in farming’s interest to work with wildlife groups – and take what’s being offered.

Only by doing this can the industry justify its receipt of taxpayers’ money, she said. Otherwise the industry risks losing out in the post-Brexit scramble for public funding.

That sounds like dialogue from a very bad Mob movie! “Dis is da best deal ya gonna get, Louie, take it – if ya knows what’s good for ya!”

Also note, another reference to “taxpayers’ money“, and “the post-Brexit scramble for public funding“. They’re all reading from the same script.

Having pissed off many, many people, Luxton left the RSPB towards the end of 2021 and joined BirdLife International.

In four years between 2018 and 2022 BirdLife’s income shot up from £22 million to over £40 million. Another indicator of how governments and corporations are using wildlife groups and conservationists to undermine agriculture globally.

Wildlife trusts here saw their income more than double between 2019 and 2022. But income from ‘Welsh Government’ grants and contracts rocketed from £769,310 to £6,821,800 in the same period.

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2019 APRIL: ‘WELSH GOVERNMENT’ DECLARES CLIMSATE EMERGENCY

April 2019 was tough in Wales. I recall people running into the streets screaming, “Lesley Griffiths (and Gary) have declared a climate emergency!”

Well, maybe I exaggerate a wee bit. For truth is, nobody really paid any attention to this pronunciamento.

Nevertheless, it was followed, in June, with a ‘10-point Plan To Fund Wales’ Climate Emergency‘ from the Future Generations Commissioner.

As might be expected, planting trees and making life even more difficult for farmers figured big in this mercifully short document.

The reality is that despite all the grandstanding, no other country on this doomed planet has allowed OPDs, created the useless post of Future Generations Commission, or declared a climate emergency.

There’s a message there.

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2019 OCTOBER: ‘WALES MAY BE A SMALL NATION . . . ‘

In full: “Wales may be a small nation, but we have a big ambition“. The words spoken by Lesley Griffiths, at a Climate Change conference in Cardiff City Hall.

Among the world-renowned climate experts attending was “ITV weather presenter Ruth Wignall“. Further down we read:

For every attendee at the conference a tree will also be planted in Mbale, Eastern Uganda, as part of the Welsh Government’s Wales for Africa programme.

Farmer Nimrod Wambette, from Mbale, will speak at the conference about how his home region is already feeling the impacts of climate change.

After enjoying an expenses-paid trip to Cardiff and a bit of pocket money Nimrod could be guaranteed to stick to the script.

It’s just more of the same, a rather sad and desperate combination of hyperbole and hysteria for which, in kinder and saner times, people would have received treatment. But what really caught my eye was this sentence:

Representatives from Extinction Rebellion will be attending to share some of their ideas about how we should be responding to the climate emergency

When you read that you know the nutters have really taken over the asylum.

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2023 NOVEMBER: AGRICULTURE (WALES) ACT 2023

This new legislation is designed to increase the influence of ‘environmentalists’ and ‘conservationists’ over Welsh farming. How do I know? Because the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) takes credit for influencing it.

It’s there, on page 4 of the WWF Annual Report.

We launched and led a successful campaign to help put the climate and nature emergencies at the core of the new Agriculture (Wales) Bill. Through a survey of rural Wales, an open letter signed by more than 50 organisations, a petition and more, WWF Cymru’s Land of Our Future/Gwlad Ein Dyfodol campaign advocated for agroecology to be central to the bill

Those experts on Welsh farming, the British Mountaineering Council, signed the WWF petition . . . but our farming unions did not.

The same WWF that’s in partnership / funded by Tesco which, like other supermarket chains, is screwing our farmers.

Makes you think, eh!

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CONCLUSION

And so we come to the Sustainable Farming Scheme, for which ‘consultations’ end on Thursday. Though I suspect that, as with NVZ and other proposals, it’s a done deal.

For Labour’s attitude towards farmers is clear. In recent months we’ve heard Joyce Watson, Mike Hedges, and first minister Drakeford himself express contempt.

To leave us in no doubt about Labour’s hatred for farmers Anna McMorrin, (former?) partner of Alun Davies, called hard-working Welsh farmers extremists, climate deniers, and conspiracy theorists in the House of Commons last week.

I could have introduced other examples of the ‘Welsh Government’s contempt, such as the refusal to do anything about bTB . . . other than to order the killing of cattle.

But I’ve given enough clues for you to guess how I see the big picture.

∼

Wildlife and environmental groups, and more recently the ‘Welsh Government’, tell us that 80/90% of Wales’s land is taken up by farming. There’s a reason for that.

By ‘farming’ they mean livestock farming. But it’s not really about farming, it’s about the land used by farming. The talk of farting cows, dirty rivers, biodiversity loss, etc, are the excuses used to destroy farming and to facilitate a land grab.

Land that’s wanted for carbon capture trees and rewilding. Which go together. Can’t have beavers without trees. And almost all the critters planned to be re-introduced are forest dwellers.

UPDATE 05.03.2024: I’ve been sent a pro forma letter that English ‘environmental’ groups have asked members and supporters to submit to the SFS consultation.

In the first line of the second paragraph: ” . . . upwards of 84% of land in Wales managed for farming”. It really chokes them, all this land – and they want it!

This also explains the involvement of vegans, and the backing for organic arable farming. Meat will be an imported luxury item that most of us will be unable to afford. (We’ll be offered insects, and factory-made ‘meat’.)

The countryside of the future will belong to an elite that will justify its advantages, and the restrictions placed on the rest of us, car-less in our 15-minute, constantly-surveiled cities, as being necessary to save the planet.

Having submitted to this cult-agenda, Labour politicians will destroy Welsh farming as we know it. And with it, a culture, a language, and a way of life.

♦ end ♦

‘Welsh Government’ Declares War On Freedoms, Motorists, Farmers

On 10.10.202311.10.2023 By JacIn Colonialism, Environmentalism, European Union, Globalism, Welsh Government26 Comments

Now that we’ve had three weeks of living with the 20mph speed restrictions I think it’s time to put this measure into its wider context, make a few connections, and introduce some new faces.

I apologise for this piece being a bit long, but it’s still less than 2,800 words. And worth sticking with.

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THE BIGGER PICTURE

Much of the background to this new legislation was covered a few weeks back in ‘20mph, A Disaster Unfolds’.

What’s absolutely clear now is that 20mph did not suddenly appear, it’s been hatching for a while. To explain what I mean, here’s a table I’ve drawn up, though I’m sure it’s incomplete, so if you can add to it . . . .

And here it is in pdf format with working links.

I believe it starts with the Well-being of Future Generation Act 2015. This cartoon video imagines ‘Megan’, growing up under the umbrella of the Act’s protective legislation. Which promises:

And it’s failed her on almost every count. But then, grand gestures done for dramatic effect rather than to deliver lasting benefits will invariably fail.

Next, we look at the Wales Act 2017. There, in Section 26, we see that power to vary or regulate speed limits is now conferred on the ‘Welsh Ministers’.

Which makes sense if, as some suggest, Wales is being used as a testing ground for the wackier planet-saving ideas.

Now we move on to an undated publication by Public Health Wales recommending 20mph on our roads. I assume this is by Huw Brunt and Sarah Jones of Public Health Wales. It mentions the new powers to lower speed limits.

Then there’s the Clean Air Zone Framework for Wales (April 2018) where, on page 20, we read:

Consideration should be given to lowering speed limits in a CAZ from 30mph to 20mph, which some research suggests would deliver overall benefits27. Safety benefits from reduced road speed can also encourage modal shift from private cars.

Perhaps, state-owned, chauffeur-driven cars are OK?

The call was taken up by Sustrans who, in a publication dated 1 January 2019, called for 20mph speed limits across the UK, quoting Public Health Wales. Does this also show Wales being used as a testing ground?

Another example of pearl-clutching theatricality was Wales declaring a climate emergency. This happened in April 2019, just before Environment Minister Lesley Griffiths (and Gary) met with Scottish and UK counterparts.

Here’s the plan for funding the responses deemed necessary to combat this ’emergency’, produced by Future Generations Commissioner and Labour party insider, Sophie Howe. From which I’ve extracted the graphic for ‘Transport’ below.

Those who compiled that table obviously view increased car ownership as something deplorable, which must be reversed. Yet for me, and I suspect for most people, those figures represent progress and increased prosperity.

Finally, we see 20mph again in Labour’s 2021 manifesto ahead of the Senedd elections. The original manifesto seems to have disappeared, so I can only link to the update put out following the agreement with Plaid Cymru.

It’s a pity the original’s disappeared because I’m told it proposed risk-based approaches to assessing trunk road speeds. Basically, ‘Welsh Government’, or an individual minister, wanted lower speed limits on A and B roads.

Perhaps Plaid Cymru, a party of rural areas with sparse traffic on open roads, realised this would not go down well in Trawsfynydd or Nant y Caws.

So we see that the call for 20mph, and associated demands, goes back at least 5 years, and probably further. We’ll briefly consider associated issues before turning to an unattainable fantasy.

One of the associated matters is 15- 0r 20-minute cities / neighbourhoods. Which can be viewed in two ways.

The optimist might say: ‘Wow! everything I need will be within easy travelling distance; Waitrose, Pilates, accountant, Skivvyhire, Green Party constituency office, ballet class, tattooist, florist, saddler, doctor, dentist, plastic surgeon . . . .’

(Dentist? In Wales!)

The cynic might ask: ‘Yes, but is that 20 minutes there, or 20 minutes there and back? And what if I want to travel for longer than 20 minutes . . . and just keep going, into the wide blue yonder?’

Sustrans was promoting the idea in November 2019, just ahead of December’s UK general election. The local chief of Sustrans for over six years (2007 – 2013) was Lee Waters, now Deputy Minister for Climate Change.

Make no mistake, Sustrans is an anti-car organisation. And Waters himself is said to be a cycling and walking “fanatic“. Which is fine with me. Veganism is fine with me. It’s when zealots and fringe outfits are allowed or encouraged to push their beliefs onto the rest of us that I object.

The Future Generations Commissioner was backing 20-minute neighbourhoods by September 2020. To show loyal, Plaid Cymru chimed in in April 2021.

Labour-controlled Cardiff council was also on board with the “20-minute neighbourhood or 15-minute city“, as this motion from March 2021 puts it. Even crediting Sustrans.

Erm, let’s think about that for a minute. A city is made up of neighbourhoods. So obviously a city is bigger than a neighbourhood. That being so, how can a city be traversed, and its services accessed, quicker than those of a neighbourhood?

I’ll touch briefly on three more elements of the grand design.

First Minister Drakeford has described ULEZ charges as the “last resort“. But he hasn’t ruled them out. Labour’s experience in London, with people fighting back, might explain his hesitancy.

Then there’s road charging, mentioned on page 21 of Llwybr Newydd The Wales Transport Strategy 2021. Where it’s spelled out quite unambiguously:

We will develop a framework for fair and equitable road-user charging in Wales and explore other disincentives to car use, taking into account equality issues including the needs of people in rural areas, people who share protected characteristics and people on low incomes

“ . . . and explore other disincentives to car use“.

Something I found odd about this was that it said, “in Wales“. But this was produced by the ‘Welsh Government’, so which other country would it refer to? Or was it written by someone else, perhaps not based in Wales?

The reference to “protected characteristics” I assume means that women with penises won’t have to pay. (Where’s my wig?)

Finally, let us never forget that it was Lee Waters who announced earlier this year that all new road-building projects were cancelled.

To achieve this result the Welsh Roads Review Panel was created with orders to deliver the desired ‘findings’. And to guarantee that outcome the group was chaired by Dr Lynn Sloman. Who wrote ‘Car Sick‘, which rather gives away her position.

I wrote about this episode in March, scroll down to the relevant section.

◊

THE WORLD OF MAKE-BELIEVE

‘Vision Zero’ seems to have appeared in September 2012. In the ‘Welsh Government’s Road Safety Delivery Plan. Explained here in a written statement from the late Carl Sargeant, then Minister for Local Government and Communities.

Here’s how Road Safety GB reported it.

Vision Zero was a vague promise to reduce road accidents. It was re-affirmed in this ‘Welsh Government’ publication from May 2018 (pp 6, 13).

But then, just a year or so later, on page 24 of the Manifesto for the 2019 UK general election, we read that Vision Zero has become a plan to eliminate road deaths and injuries entirely!

Let’s give a little more thought to this idea of Vision Zero.

It should be obvious that Vision Zero can only be achieved by banning all vehicles, whether powered by the internal combustion engine, battery, or hydrogen.

But with more bicycles and pedestrians on the roads – as is hoped – there will still be fatalities and injuries. Either cyclists crashing or cyclists colliding with pedestrians. It happens now. With more cyclists, and with cyclists having freedom of the highways, some will be even more reckless and inconsiderate than they are now.

With vehicular transport banned – and that must also mean public transport – then people will spend far more time at home.

But most accidents happen in the home, so spending more time at home will result in more accidents. Don’t take my word for it, read what RoSPA says on the subject. So how is transferring death and injury from the highway to the home an improvement?

It’s not an improvement at all. It only makes sense if the real goal is to ban cars.

More people spending more time at home will create other problems. I can predict with certainty there’ll be more cases of domestic violence, and murder. There will be more children physically and sexually abused. Even more cruelty towards domestic pets.

Also, more suicides, due to the stress of being cooped up at home. It will be a kind of lockdown. And it will be done despite us knowing the social and psychological damage inflicted by Covid lockdown.

But then, it may be dressed up as climate lockdown. And if so, then we must accept that chasing each other round the house with meat cleavers is an acceptable price to pay for saving the planet.

Think about what you’ve just read. Put it all together and tell me it’s not a war on cars, on private transport, and the freedom the car gives us.

◊

RULE FROM THE SHADOWS

I’m returning to the idea of Wales being used as a testing ground. With most people unaware of it, and the lack of awareness even extending to the ‘Welsh Government’.

But testing ground status is easy to achieve when our politicians are controlled by pressure groups. These often directed and / or funded by individuals and organisations making up the Globalist network.

I’ve written about this phenomenon a number of times recently. In Wales: Ruled By Pressure Groups. And Who The Hell Are These People!. The ‘Welsh Government’ even pays through the nose for this Globalist influence, as I explained in Lynn Global Pushes Globalist Agenda.

The bigger picture only makes sense when you remember how it started.

With the end of Communism a new threat was needed. And so in 1991 the Club of Rome adopted ‘global warming’. Explained in this video (less than 5 minutes long).

Klaus Schwab, founder and chairperson of the World Economic Forum (WEF), makes an appearance. Schwab is also a member of the Club of Rome.

This programme of control was easy to sell to third-rate leftist politicians in Wales because socialism is fundamentally anti-human; viewing us as classes or identities, even “protected characteristics“, rather than gloriously varied individuals.

And of course, socialists love imposing “Can’t do that!” restrictions.

Now for the new faces I promised.

◊

NORTH STAR TRANSITION

This company was formed just over three years ago by Jyotir Banerjee. The website is full of silly phrases interspersed with impenetrable jargon: “multi-capital metrics” . . . “radical reframing and holistic transformation” . . .

It’s not often one encounters so much bullshit on a single website. Thankfully.

The clue to North Star’s real purpose comes in a piece written a few weeks ago by Banerjee himself. We are told that “biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse and climate change” can all be remedied – by “large-scale investment funding“.

Now you know me, when a chancer crosses my path I like to know more about him or her. Did I really say, “chancer“? (Inner voice: “Yes you did, Jac.”)

First stop was Companies House, to see what our boy has been up to over the years. There are a number of companies to his name, which are either dissolved, dormant or, if still trading, then none too buoyant, to judge by the accounts submitted.

The address currently used for Banerjee’s empire is 1 Pembroke Villas, The Green, Richmond. And a very nice gaff it looks too. But according to the Land Registry this property is leased to a firm of accountants.

The reason I’m writing about Banerjee is his Wales Transition Lab.

But what is Wales to be ‘transitioned’ into? And by whom? And for whose benefit?

This piece from the North Star website by Victoria Topham of Buckinghamshire informs us that:

Since October 2020, a group of 35 thought leaders across Wales have listened to each other and imagined a country that future generations could thrive in.

“Listened to each other“! I see a gang of interlopers discussing the future of our homeland without consulting us. This is often called colonialism.

Topham continues . . .

Why Wales? With a population of 3m people, Wales is the right size for such a living laboratory.

Now she’s gone full-on memsahib. For her and her ‘thought leaders’ our Wales is just a testing ground. With us indigenes as guinea-pigs? Or are we to be removed?

Despite this clique being anonymous one name found on the North Star website is, inevitably, Jane Davidson, who seems to serve as a kind of chatelaine to that demi-monde where enviroshysters have the ear of politicians and civil servants.

After claiming to have initially been reluctant to get involved Banerjee eventually joined Davidson’s Wales Net Zero 2035 Challenge Group. (How many different target years do these people use?)

In his homage to La Davidson Banerjee writes: “Olivier Boutellis and I set up North Star Transition to tackle the climate emergency . . . “.

My cue to introduce Olivier Boutellis and explain what I think is really happening.

Despite what Banerjee says, Boutellis was not there at the start (unless he was keeping his head down). For North Star Transition was launched 10 June 2020 and the company Olivier Boutellis-Taft SPRL climbed aboard 3 February 2021.

This company was registered in Belgium 04 October 2011.

So who is Olivier Boutellis, or Boutellis-Taft?

The capture below from the European Parliament tells us he’s a lawyer and an economist. And this tells us he’s been a magistrate and a lecturer. Also, CEO of Accountancy Europe.

But it’s his Linkedin profile that I found fascinating. The screen capture below will explain why.

It tells us Olivier Boutellis-Taft joined the Club of Rome EU Chapter at exactly the same time he got involved with Jyotir Banerjee and North Star Transition.

But there’s something not right. The website looks abandoned, and the Twitter account hasn’t been used since September 2020.

There is also a Linkedin page of the most elementary kind. But it claims the Club of Rome EU Chapter has 11 employees and that its focus is on “sustainability” and “environmental services“.

But understandable doubts to one side, let’s accept Banerjee and Boutellis-Taft at face value. I believe they’re promising to find ‘investors’ looking to buy Welsh farmland for carbon offsetting, or in other ways take land out of agricultural production.

Which fits perfectly with the Globalist agenda to destroy small- to medium-sized farms so that corporations can take control of the food supply. Because if you control the food supply then you control the people.

The opening part of this 2-minute video explains it succinctly.

∼

This Globalist agenda is welcomed by the environmental pressure groups because it destroys farming, especially livestock farming, and most of these activists seem to be vegans.

They also anticipate getting some of the grabbed land for their rewilding fantasies.

Because of course there’ll be fewer people living in the countryside. Take out the main industry and the decline begins. Impose travel restrictions, run down public transport and impose other obstacles and rural living becomes even less attractive.

At the top and the bottom both Globalists and environmental activists know what they want, and are guaranteed to benefit. It’s those in the middle of the scam who, along with the people, will lose out.

Because politicians don’t seem to realise that in the New World Order they are surplus to requirements. As Klaus Schwab explains in this very short video – in the future we won’t need elections.

“Can you imagine such a world?“, he asks. Yes, I can; and while losing politicians has its attractions . . .

Without elections we won’t need politicians, except to serve as ‘managers’ for their Globalist masters. Which is not a lot different to what they’re doing now.

Our politicians have been fooled into thinking they’re saving the planet when what they’re really doing is sacrificing Wales and other countries to the psychotic ambitions of the Globalists.

And this explains dreamers, chancers, shysters and con men flocking to Wales.

◊

CONCLUSION

As I hope I’ve explained, 20mph speed restrictions should not be viewed in isolation. They are part of something much, much bigger.

You’re free to dismiss me as a conspiracy theorist. It’s a free world. For now. But before you go . . .

Justify Vision Zero transferring deaths and injuries from highway to home without admitting it’s a plan to do away with cars. Do you think Jyotir Banerjee’s “large-scale investment funding” is designed to save the Welsh family farm? And why does Klaus Schwab talk about abolishing elections?

♦ end ♦

It’s Getting Sinister

On 09.08.202310.08.2023 By JacIn Corruption, Environmentalism, Globalism, Welsh Government39 Comments

This quickie begins with the response to a Freedom of Information request. It concerns ‘Welsh Government’ dealings with an outfit called Lynn, which former Future Generations Commissioner, Sophie Howe, joined in May as a ‘Global Strategic Partner’.

‘Global Strategic Partner’! Has she ever lived outside of Cardiff?

The sole director and shareholder of Lynn Group Ltd and Lynn Global Ltd – the latter formed just a month after Howe joined – remains Shayoni Sarkar Lynn. She studied at Cardiff University (where else?) and is married to a Welshman.

So let’s turn to the FoI mentioned at the top, and the reason I’m writing this piece.

◊

TOO MUCH TO HANDLE

This FoI request, dated 27 July, simply asked for . . .

a copy of all correspondence, digital or otherwise, both internal and external (including time sent) that reasonably relate to Welsh Government’s use of communications consultancy Lynn to promote the 20 MPH zone law, from 1 July 2022 to date.

It seems straightforward enough, and surely a request easy enough to satisfy, covering just a year, and a single topic.

But the response, as you can read below, makes clear that there was a lot of traffic between Lynn and the ‘Welsh Government’ in that period. For a quick shufty turned up over 2,000 documents!

The FoI. Click to open enlarged in separate tab

Of course, the accounts for the period covered in the FoI have not yet been filed with Companies House. But the accounts for the previous year, ending 31 March, 2022 are available. And they make for interesting reading.

The number of employees went up from 5 the previous year to 12 in y/e 31 March, 2022, and money in the bank went up from £199,227 to £1,650,756. I’ll repeat that for the hard of reading. Cash in hand, for a small company, went up by £1.45m in a single year.

Yes, creditors account for £1,172,195, but most of that figure is covered by ‘accruals and deferred income’. This probably means income from the previous year, but it’s not money owed to anybody.

And remember, that previous year, ending 31 March, 2021, was the first year in business for the Lynn Group (originally Lynn PR). Which tells us that Shayoni Sarkar Lynn hit the ground running. Dare we assume the work was already promised and all she had to do was set up the company?

How much did Lynn earn in year ending 31.03.2023, the period largely covered by the FoI request, and how much of it came from ‘WelshGovernment’?

Did Lynn have any other clients, or was it just the ‘Welsh Government’? The Spartan website certainly mentions no clients. There are a few campaigns listed, but no claim that Lynn was involved in them.

Come to that, what exactly does Lynn do? What does it offer clients? Here’s Shayoni Lynn to tell us.

Well, whaddya know, it’s “behavioural science“. Which is getting people to believe in things they wouldn’t readily believe in. A kind of brainwashing. Or coercion.

The kind of thing politicians do when trying to push unpopular policies, like, er . . . oh I don’t know, maybe 20mph zones. Which is of course what the FoI request was about.

And she makes no secret of her admiration for the MS for Llanelli (resident in Penarth). Though given the money that association has brought her I can understand why she’s delighted to support Lee Waters and 20mph.

But we are still no nearer to understanding exactly what she did for that money.

The Twitter / X account I grabbed the above image from contains a number of gems that leave us in no doubt as to how Shayoni Lynn operates. It’s the “Scare them shitless” UN-WEF strategy used to get people to believe in the ‘climate crisis’.

Lynn describes it as, “impactful fear appeals“. Yeah, like I said – “Scare ’em shitless“.

From what I can see, the wonderful and universally respected ‘Welsh Government’ is paying this woman – and others – to frighten us into accepting their Globalist agenda.

Is this a proper use of public funding? And how much are we talking about?

◊

SOPHIE HOWE

Now we have to consider where and how Sophie Howe fits into the picture.

After leaving her sinecure as the Future Generations Commissioner in February Sophie Howe was soon putting herself about.

She started her own company, Sophie Howe Associates Ltd . . . with her as the only associate. In June she became a trustee of Coleg Soros. And a Scottish source tells me she’s also got a seat aboard the Bute Energy gravy train.

And of course she joined Lynn. But why?

It couldn’t be because Shayoni Lynn needed influence in Corruption Bay, for she was already living high on the hog of Welsh public funding. There had to be another reason.

Being an aficionado of Mafia movies I know there’s often a scene when the local kingpin insists on a job for a relative. Just think of The Godfather, when young Vito Corleone loses his job in the grocery store to Don Fanucci’s nephew.

Don Fanucci. Click to open enlarged in separate tab

Alternatively, the Mob moves somebody into a business they’ve invested in in order to protect that investment.

Which is it with Lynn and Sophie Howe?

Don’t get me wrong, I am not for one minute doubting Sophie Howe’s talents; but let’s be honest, we’re dealing here with ‘Welsh’ Labour, and as political parties go, this lot comes bloody close to being a criminal enterprise.

(Though mentioning ‘enterprise’ in their company might get you whacked!)

◊

CONCLUSION

I’ve written a lot about those clowns down in Corruption Bay, and the system of third sector spongers, funded pressure groups, and assorted cronies, that serves as an echo chamber protecting them from the reality of an increasingly restless population.

But with Shayoni Sarkar Lynn we have entered new and dangerous territory. For we are being manipulated and frightened into accepting policy decisions over which we were never consulted and with which the majority of us do not agree.

This is a form of totalitarianism. And yet we are paying for it!

And it comes with a failing NHS; with our poorest kids going without meals this summer; with a community in Llanelli on edge as it waits for ‘refugees’ every man and his dog knows are not refugees; as rural Wales is turned into an open-air power station with turbines and pylons – to supply England; and as the no roads, ‘degrowth’ agenda demanded by demented Globalists is imposed.

I therefore call on opposition politicians to demand that this Freedom of Information request be answered properly. Because we are entitled to know how much public money has been paid to Shayoni Lynn and her Lynn Group Ltd to lie to us, and to frighten us.

Because if opposition politicians don’t oppose, and the will of the people can be ignored by a cult-like minority that’s persuaded itself we, the common herd, are stupid and bigoted (and they have), then democracy is as good as dead.

UPDATE: A good source directs me to this Sell2Wales entry (22/12/2021) seeking tenders for: “NPS Media Buying, Integrated Marketing Campaigns and Public Relations Services Framework”. Of 16 applications 12 were accepted.

The 12 were approached for what was now the, “20 mph National Campaign” (17/08/2022), only 5 tendered, and if we click on the tab ‘Full Notice Text’ we see Lynn PR was successful. For some reason, ‘Estimated Total Value’ is left blank.

My source points out: a) Lynn was competing with more experienced and better resourced competitors; b) tenders are not accepted from companies with less than 3 years experience, which should have ruled Lynn PR out.

That Lynn PR got the 20mph contract suggests that someone in Corruption Bay smiled on Shayoni Lynn. That Sophie Howe, the ultimate Labour insider, has joined Lynn, would seem to confirms this suspicion.

But that still leaves the mystery of the work Lynn PR was doing that paid so well before being awarded the 20mph contract.

♦

I promised a piece on Bute Energy, its links with the ‘Welsh Government’, and a few associated snippets, but it’ll have to wait until next week.

♦ end ♦

Bute Energy, Update, 30.06.2023

On 30.06.202319.07.2023 By JacIn Colonialism, Environmentalism, Welsh Government, World Economic Forum38 Comments

This piece has been off / on for a while, due to other matters cropping up to grab my attention. But in the end, it worked out, because new information is emerging all the time.

To avoid going over too much old ground I shall devote most of this piece to what’s new. Those wanting more information on what’s gone before can type ‘Bute Energy’ in the search box atop the sidebar.

The whole article, including quoted passages, is roughly 3,000 words, so rather than gulp it down in one you can take it a piece at a time. You know it makes sense!

♦

BUTE ENERGY, A SHORT RÉSUMÉ

In recent years I’ve written a lot about Bute Energy and the various companies under that umbrella. This ever-expanding empire began life in London, at 20 Primrose Street, otherwise known as the Broadgate Tower in the City.

Then it used an address in Edinburgh’s New Town (above Gant), probably because the principals, Oliver James Millican, Stuart Allan George and Lawson Douglas Steele, seem to be Scottish, or resident in Scotland.

But over the past year we’ve seen use made of an address at Hodge House in Cardiff. This being a desperate but unconvincing attempt to suggest that Bute is a Welsh company.

“Pass the bara brith, Blodwen, indeed to goodness, look you!”

This change of address simply means that the invitations to meet ‘Russian brides’, the 50p off! at Tesco vouchers, and the Vote for Dai Scroggins election leaflets get delivered to Sir Julian’s old gaff.

And let’s not forget the overseas investment, for Bute is in partnership with Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners. The name says ‘Copenhagen’, but the money could be coming from anywhere.

Bute Energy, through a host of companies, many carrying the name of a specific project – such as Bryn Glas Energy Park Ltd – wants to build ‘Energy Parks’ the length of Wales; twenty-three at the latest count. These locations may also include solar arrays, and even hydrogen whatsits.

The map below is my best guess of where these wind farms are. I may have mis-located one or two.

Opposition has been mounting for some time to Bute’s grand designs, but resistance has tended to be localised, confined to areas immediately affected by one of the few projects for which Bute has revealed its plans.

But most of the sites remain little more than Companies House entries offering the bare minimum of information.

Resistance increased a while ago when news broke that Bute wanted to bring power from its ‘Nant Mithil’ (Radnor Forest) site along 60 miles of pylons to link up with the grid running east from Pembroke power station.

If we accept the route map produced by Bute, then the connection with the grid is to be made somewhere south of Carmarthen town.

Though when asked exactly where the connection is to be made, at a ‘Have Your Say’ meeting in the RWS showground, Llanelwedd, Bute head honcho, Millican, was unable to answer.

So let’s see if I can fill in any gaps.

What follows will be in some kind of chronological order; which means I’ve tried to present the fresh evidence in the order it became known to me.

◊

LAND USE CONSULTANTS AND OTHERS

This first item takes us back a couple of years, but it seems to have been overlooked. It cropped up in this tweet from April 2021. (The link is broken.)

Land Use Consultants was formed by Edward Max Nicholson in 1966. Five years earlier, with Sir Peter Scott and others, he set up the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). I guess LUC has been recruited in another attempt to burnish Bute’s environmental credentials.

Bute and LUC were together at the ‘inception meeting’ last December with ‘Welsh Government’s Planning & Environmental Decisions outfit to discuss the ‘Nant Mithil Grid Connection Project‘ (page 6).

Intriguingly, LUC has been involved with the so-called ‘Welsh Government’ since at least 2010. As shown by this report, Research: Planning Implications of Renewable and Low Carbon Energy.

Though for other projects Bute seems to employ different planning consultants. For the Nant Mithil site itself it’s David Bell Planning, of Edinburgh; for Llyn Lort it seems to be Carney Sweeney, of Birmingham; and for Rhiwlas it’s RSK, of Cheshire.

LUC also seems to be picking up other work in Wales. I know it’s working with Natural Resources Wales on the Dark Skies project.

Which makes perfect sense. Because with the Corruption Bay Clown Show determined to switch to Unreliables it won’t be long before we shan’t need to travel to darkest Powys to escape ‘light pollution’.

◊

TWO NEW ‘ENERGY PARKS’

Orddu is one of the new sites. As you can see on the map above, the nearest town is Bala. To be more precise, Orddu is north east of Bala and sits above the smallholding of Cwm-cywen in Cwm Main, where my father-in-law was born and raised.

A company has been formed with the usual three directors. Here’s the Companies House entry.

The other new energy park, Moel Chwa, is across the A5 and just to the east of another Bute site at Mwdwl-eithin. At the time of writing there is no company bearing the Moel Chwa name, but there is a website mention.

Moel Chwa seems to be very close to an earlier project by Clean Earth Energy Ltd called Nant Bach. Are they related?

The Companies House entry for Nant Bach Turbine Ltd suggests Clean Earth erected just a single turbine. Which the filed accounts value at £2,273,106, giving some idea of the kind of money we’re talking about.

◊

GRIDS & NETWORKS

As I mentioned, opposition to Bute’s ambitions got a boost with news of the plan for 60 miles of pylons from Nant Mithill (Radnor Forest) to the west-east grid connection near Carmarthen.

This has been linked with Bute’s Green Generation Energy Networks Cymru Ltd.

It’s also being suggested that, in a belated attempt to make up for the past two decades in which they encouraged foreign companies – many government owned – to exploit Wales with no local returns, ‘Welsh’ Labour is now pretending it can create something like a Welsh national grid.

The announcement I just linked to came a few days after the Commons’ Welsh Affairs Committee produced ‘Grid capacity in Wales’.

And while neither document mentioned Bute Energy, many observers believe that Bute Energy is heavily involved. Some believe Bute will build Julie James’ ‘Welsh grid’.

For naked corruption would be the only other interpretation for the very close, and financially lucrative, links between Bute and a number of ‘Welsh’ Labour insiders.

From the Green Gen Cymru Network video. “Endless potential” is quite chilling. Click to open enlarged in separate tab

But then, confusion abounds on the subject of networks, with Julie James, Minister for Climate Change, as confused as anyone, according to a knowledgeable contact. For this source suggests she doesn’t understand there are two different types of grid.

My source explains the difference here.

We know that Bute wants new pylons from the Radnor Forest to somewhere in the vicinity of Carmarthen, and to then take that power to Usk and over the border. This it calls “Phase 1“.

It’s suggested Phase 2 (and another line of pylons?) will start somewhere near Eisteddfa Gurig, close to the A44, inland of Aberystwyth, and run to (and here I quote my source) “Chirk Grid Supply Point’ (as yet unbuilt)“.

Although Phase 2 is still a bit hazy, there would appear to be confirmation out there. According to the documents reproduced below, Bute projects in west central and northern Wales will run to the as yet unbuilt Chirk GSP.

References to ‘Chirk’ obviously cause confusion because Chirk GSP doesn’t exist. But what does exist is not far away at Lower Frankton. The problem here being that Lower Frankton is in Shropshire.

On this OS map the border is in purple, it shows Chirk as just about the nearest point, in Wales, to Lower Frankton. So is Lower Frankton being called Chirk to pretend it’s in Wales, and therefore boost Wales’ Net Zero credentials?

Further evidence of grid ambitions came a few weeks back with the Infrastructure (Wales) Bill. You’ll see it talks of making it easier for the James Gang to give consent for “overhead electric lines”.

There are also links with Ireland. One comes up near Bodelwyddan, inland of Abergele. Then there’s the Greenlink Interconnector, ensuring that “Excess power can be shared between Ireland and the UK”.

Finally, let’s look at a link from Scotland. Nation.Cymru reported this last November, and parroted the National Grid’s press handout about it being to “upgrade Wales’ electricity network and take advantage of offshore power“.

In fact, and to get technical, I hear work has started on the Bangor (Pentir) to Swansea (North) 400kv double-circuit pylon line.

Let Uncle Jac explain this one . . .

England needs more electricity . . . but not the turbines and the pylons. So the turbines are in Scotland, the cables carrying the electricity run under the Irish Sea, come ashore near Bangor, go overland to Swansea, where they join the west-east line from Pembroke, and then on to England.

As my well-informed source put it, “The two grid connections out of south Wales into England currently have no constraints so it appears as if Wales is being used as a ‘transmission corridor’ from Scotland to England”.

◊

NEWS FROM SCOTLAND

A couple of weeks ago I had an e-mail from Glasgow. As you know, I get lots of e-mails, but this is worth mentioning because it suggests that this source is keeping an eye on Bute’s operations in Scotland.

Before I tell you what it says, I’d better identify some of those mentioned.

Erik Bonino was an oil executive who joined Bute in July 2020 but left early this year due to alleged naughtiness by Bute in Senghenydd. Or that’s how I heard it.

The story made it into Llais y Sais, where Shippo covered it.

David James Taylor was spad to Rhodri Morgan, Peter Hain and Carwyn Jones. He has profited greatly from being Bute’s entry to ‘Welsh Government’.

You’ll see that the source suggests Taylor has been replaced by the fragrant Sophie Howe, the former Future Generations Commissioner. This would fit well with her new job with Lynn. (Until May last year, ‘Lynn PR Ltd’.)

Sophie Howe has landed on her feet, again, due to her manifest and dazzling talents. Her raking it in, again, is completely unconnected with knowing everybody worth knowing in ‘Welsh Government’, ‘Welsh’ Labour, and civil service.

Happy to clear that up.

By “Reece Emmett” I think my source means Reece Emmitt. (Here in pdf format.) Though I can’t see any obvious connection with the Labour party. But after 5 years in Cardiff University that can be almost guaranteed.

There have been big divisions in Bute management. Chairman Erik Bonino lost a power struggle with Oliver Millican, the majority shareholder, now Bonino and his allies have been cleared out.

Team Millican: Stuart George, Lawson Steele, Gareth Williams.

Team Bonino: Mark Vyvyan Robinson, Gemma Hamilton, David Taylor.

Bonino was known to be nervous and raised concerns about unethical practices regarding securing land and some of the heavy legal agreements and gagging orders Bute were trying to impose on landowners and residents. He was concerned only about his own image and reputation though not about the welfare of the landowners and communities. He was also nervous about all the bad publicity Bute were getting generally and how it was impacting on him.

Bonino recruited Mark Vyvyan Robinson from EDF (where he had been for 20 years) as CEO but he left shortly after a few months. Gemma Hamilton (development director) David Taylor (comms director) were both in same camp and left soon after along with Bonino. and some junior staff.

Millican made himself chairman and installed his sidekick Stuart George as Managing Director. Both are woefully inexperienced and the whole operation is now considered a joke in the industry.

They brought in Derek Hastings from SSE to replace Gemma Hamilton. They basically are paying people 3x what they get elsewhere which is how they recruit people.

They are throwing money around and recently brought in two people to replace DT: Sophie Howe as an “adviser” to help with Welsh govt / Labour link. And Aled Rowlands a former aide to Nick Bourne to try and sort the Tories. Obviously that is failing badly cos the Welsh Tories hate Bourne.

Also Reece Emmett ex Welsh Labour apparatchik is in the comms team.

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ANTZ CYMRU

I suppose we’d better start this section with the ANTZ Cymru website’s announcement of the link-up with Bute Energy. Which prompts a few comments.

First, there is no entity called ANTZ Cymru, it’s a flag of convenience for ANTZ UK Ltd of Manchester. Realising there’s money to be made in Wales ANTZ is another company that has adopted a faux Welsh identity.

A good source in Powys, sees parallels between ANTZ and something called the Behavioural Insights Team (BIT). Which says of itself, “We are the original Nudge Unit”. BIT is an international outfit with its UK office in Manchester.

Here’s a BIT website page to which I was directed called ‘How to build a Net Zero society’. I was also nudged (geddit!) in the direction of, ‘A Manifesto for Applying Behavioral (sic) Science’.

And then, from 2010, we have ‘Mindspace‘, focusing on “influencing behaviour“.

This all begins to sound like getting people to think the way you want them to think. To accept that black is white. Dare we say – brainwashing?

Will we see people stumbling out of village halls repeating, “Wind turbines are nice . . . I love pylons . . . Mark Drakeford is the most gifted and accomplished politician of his era”.

An exaggeration, I confess, but we are talking of mind games here. Getting people to think a certain way, and then there’s the careful use of language. Here’s a couple of gems from the page announcing the partnership.

We read: “ANTZ Cymru is developing a bespoke person-centred, Social Value monitoring system on behalf of Bute Energy that tracks the individual.”

Tracks the individual! What the hell does that mean?

Then there’s this, “The renewable energy team at Bute Energy is planning to deliver a family of wind and solar farms across Wales”. A family!

“Oh look, children – there’s Daddy wind turbine, and there’s Mammy wind turbine, and all the little – 820ft! – baby wind turbines”.

Did you ever read such bollocks?

How much is Bute paying ANTZ? To judge by what my Scottish contact told us, it’s probably well over the odds.

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CPRW COMPLAINT

As I’ve explained, Bute goes to great lengths in attempts to prove it’s a Welsh company serving Wales. As I hope I’ve made clear, what Bute and others are actually doing is exploiting the complicity of the Corruption Bay buffoons to turn Wales into a vast open-air power station for England.

If the wind farms planned and mooted ever get built, then Wales, apart from national parks and built-up areas, will be covered in turbines and pylons. All happening in a country that already produces more electricity than she needs!

I was encouraged therefore to read that the Campaign for the Protection of Rural Wales (CPRW) has reported Bute to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for making misleading claims.

Point 1 of the complaint (below) sums it up. Electricity produced in Wales goes into the UK national grid and thence to wherever it’s needed. Bute therefore cannot promise to supply Welsh homes with green energy.

Well done, Ross Evans and CPRW. And the very best of luck.

◊

CONCLUSION: THINGS CAN ONLY GET BETTER

What you’ve read might make you despair, but that’s because you’ve been reading about Wales. Elsewhere, things seem to be looking up.

But perhaps not in Germany. Or not yet.

Though Siemens has taken a hit recently due to component problems in Siemens Gamesa wind turbines. But many believe the problems are more widespread. Not least because the components used by Gamesa are used by other manufacturers.

More on Siemens, linking with Bute Energy. And on ‘Creaky Wind Turbines’.

In fact, the German economy is in trouble. Over-reliance on Russian gas – which NATO sabotaged – closing its last three nuclear power plants, and going hell-for-leather on ‘Renewables’ hasn’t helped.

But the Germans aren’t stupid. They’ll soon realise their mistake.

Which is what appears to have happened in Sweden, where the news is much more encouraging. The government there has turned its back on the unattainable goal of 100% renewable energy. What will Greta say!

While next door, in Norway, we read . . .

The fact is that Western governments, under pressure from the public and the dictates of common sense, are starting to reject the Globalists’ degrowth agenda and their stooges’ insistence on Net Zero.

Yet as some countries wake up to the cost of Net Zero others continue to sleepwalk towards disaster. Unfortunately, we live in one. And it has consequences.

Just before last Christmas Tata put out a press release saying it would ‘pause’ operations at its Port Talbot steel plant, the largest in Europe, and its tinplate operation at Trostre, in Llanelli, “to reduce strain on grid”.

As we are forced to depend more and more on Unreliables the electricity supply will become more erratic; and that means jobs paying good wages, like the thousands at Margam and Trostre, will be lost.

An absurd price to pay for the unattainable goal of 100% of electricity from ‘renewables’ – in order to fight a ‘climate crisis’ that’s not happening! The only beneficiaries are the governments, corporations, and investors owning the wind turbines on our soil.

And so every wind farm and pylon run should be treated as another Tryweryn. For they mean Cymru being exploited to satisfy the greed of strangers. And to keep the lights on in England.

♦ end ♦

England’s wind turbines – in Wales!

On 11.10.202113.04.2023 By JacIn Colonialism, Environmentalism, Planning, Welsh Government, Wind Turbines35 Comments

My intention was to start winding down this blog, spend more time with my wife, grand-children, books, Malbec . . . but things keep cropping up. That said, it’s very unlikely I shall undertake major new investigations. Diolch yn fawr.

♦

Last week, I introduced you to the Bute empire, based in Edinburgh and London, which, under a variety of company names, is planning many new wind farms in Wales.

This week’s piece is partly a recap, partly putting a new slant on things, and partly some fresh thoughts on the unequal relationship between Wales and England.

♦

MAPPING IT OUT

Here are the location-specific Bute Energy companies, sixteen in all, each with a link to the relevant Companies House entry. Is there a project near you?

The full list of recent company formations, and other background information, can be found here.

I’ve now drawn up a map showing what I hope is the correct location of each of Bute’s planned wind farms. I can’t be absolutely sure because in most cases all we have is a company name, and that name could fit a number of locations.

The names Rhiwlas and Moelfre, for example, can be found in many locations.

But by ruling out urban areas, National Parks, etc., etc . . .

To help them build these wind farms, Bute’s head honcho, Oliver James Millican, and his constantly growing band expect help from both Labour Party insider David James Taylor and Lesley Griffiths MS, the Minister for Rural Affairs in the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’.

I’m not exactly sure what’s expected from Taylor, but he’s been made a Member of Grayling Capital LLP, and he’s also been given shares in Windward Enterprises Ltd, both in his own name and that of his company Moblake Associates Ltd.

Taylor seems to be paying himself some £200,000 a year from Moblake Ltd but the skeletal accounts give no indication of where the money originates. Though, strictly speaking, and quoting the ‘accounts’, the money is, ‘an interest free loan and does not have a repayment date’.

But seeing as Taylor is the sole Moblake director, and holds the only share, for him to ‘repay’ Moblake would just be transferring money from one pocket to another.

From Ms Griffiths Millican and whoever he might be working with obviously expect planning permissions. I’m not for one minute suggesting favouritism, let alone inducements. It’s simply that, as we saw when she overruled the Planning Inspector’s decision on Hendy Wind Farm, she has the final say.

Griffiths and Taylor are well known to each other. It would be unusual if they weren’t, seeing as they belong to the same political party and are both from the north east. Here’s Taylor out canvassing for Lesley Griffiths in the 2016 Welsh Assembly elections.

◊

A WEE DIGRESSION, BUT INTERESTING

Something I didn’t explore in the previous post was the fact that Taylor, Griffiths, Sophie Howe (Commissioner for Greenwash), and others, were on the same side before and after the Carl Sargeant suicide in November 2017.

This picture below, from 2014/15, shows, left to right, Carl Sargeant, Sophie Howe, a former Spad to Sargeant (though when the photo was taken she was deputy to former MP Alun Michael, the South Wales PCC), Lesley Griffiths, and Leighton Andrews AM for Rhondda, who lost his seat in 2016 to Leannein Wood.

David Taylor worked as a Spad or trouser presser for Andrews, and his loyalty to the party was rewarded when, in 2016, he was the Labour candidate for the North Wales PCC post. He lost out to Arfon Jones, the Plaid Cymru candidate.

L to R: Carl Sargeant, Sophie Howe, Lesley Griffiths, Leighton Andrews. Click to open in separate tab

The thing about this picture is, it’s not a ‘work’ photo, they’re out together relaxing. They know each other, they obviously enjoy each other’s company.

After Sargeant’s suicide they all rallied to his defence, or at least, they didn’t do any favours to then First Minister Carwyn Jones, lobbyists Deryn, and others coming under fire. Lesley Griffiths is quoted more than once in this report.

In this piece, we read that Sophie Howe: ‘ . . . told Coroner John Gittins: “I find that incredible that he (Sargeant) can be sacked without being told what the allegations were.”’

While Leighton Andrews has plenty to say on his blog.

In this November 2018 report from the Wrexham Leader we are told that, ‘The inquest also heard a statement from David Taylor, a friend of Mr Sargeant who was previously employed by the Labour Party.’

It’s all coincidence, no doubt, but from this small group around Carl Sargeant we have three – Howe, Griffiths, Taylor – currently contributing to Wales being ripped off by every shyster who can spin a line about saving the planet.

◊

‘JUST A FEW QUESTIONS, SIR’ (Oh, the times I’ve heard that!)

I wrote to Bute Energy last Tuesday morning, ahead of office hours, giving them the chance to clarify a few points for this follow-up.

My questions were:

When and where did you first meet David James Taylor?
Were you introduced to Taylor? If so, by whom?
What is your relationship with Taylor’s Moblake companies?
Why did you make Taylor a Member of Grayling Capital LLP?
Why did you give Taylor (and Moblake) shares in Windward Enterprises
Have you met Lesley Griffiths, Welsh Government Minister for Rural Affairs? If so, where and when?
Did you have advance warning of Ms Griffiths’ overturning a Planning Inspector’s decision on Hendy Wind Farm in October 2018?
Why did you recruit former Labour MEP Derek Vaughan to chair your Welsh Advisory Board?
Why does your Welsh Advisory also have as a member John Uden, a former London police officer now specialising in property security, who, apparently, has no Welsh connections?
Why do you have so many wind farms planned for Wales?
You don’t know Wales, so how did you find these sites? Did someone recommend them?
Do the principals in Bute and the other companies have any experience in engineering, construction, renewables, or related fields?
Do you really intend building wind farms or will you simply obtain planning permission and then sell the sites?
Talking of the sites, have you been promised that, if necessary, powers of compulsory purchase will be exercised on your behalf?
Do you have contact details for David James Taylor?
Do you have anything you’d like to say?

I’m still waiting for answers.

Having mentioned the ‘skeletal accounts’ of David Taylor’s Moblake Ltd I naturally got to wondering about the accountant.

At the start, Moblake’s registered address was in the West End of London, at 109 Gloucester Place. It’s the tidy-looking gaff with the blue door. Though the company registered at that address, Adams Mitchell Ltd, was only formed in August 2019.

In fairness, it looks as though David Taylor was simply using Gloucester Place as an accommodation address. The ‘accounts’ submitted were all his own work.

Though the most recent accounts are a tale of West End to East End. For Moblake’s latest accounts were signed off by Naail & Co Ltd, a husband and wife outfit on Lambeth Walk in property leased with money borrowed from banks.

But the accounts remain unaudited. The accountant just signed off what Taylor put in front of him.

Accountant’s contribution to the latest Moblake Ltd accounts (y/e 30.04.2021). Click to open in separate tab.

Couldn’t David Taylor have found a nice, respectable accountant in Wales who would have presented fully audited and verified accounts?

Makes you wonder.

◊

‘HERE YOU ARE, TAFF – DON’T SAY WE DON’T GIVE YOU NOTHING’

Maybe I’d better explain what I mean by the heading to this article about England’s wind turbines in Wales. Now pay attention, because this is a bit complicated, and prefaced with, ‘As I understand it . . . ‘.

In 2015 legislation was passed, covering England and Wales, that gave local planning authorities – i.e. councils – powers to decide on wind farms of 10MW and above. (They already had the power over smaller installations.)

This had been mooted for some years and finally came into effect, on June 18, 2015. With political spin about upholding election promises by letting ‘local people have the final say on wind farm applications’.

Hinting that this was a decision dictated by electoral considerations. For wind farms are erected in rural areas, and the rural areas of England are overwhelmingly Conservative in their political sentiments.

The Conservative and Unionist Party would lose MPs and councils if a Tory government in London over-ruled local councils to impose wind farms on areas where locals didn’t want them.

The map below might help illustrate my point.

You can do your own by going to this site, and by playing with the various layers on the interactive map you can end up with whatever your heart desires.

Image: Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy / Barbour ABI. Click to open in separate tab

To reproduce my map, from the menu on the left: In ‘Energy Type’, keep Wind Onshore. In ‘Energy Capacity’, 10MW and Above. In ‘Status’, Application Submitted, Awaiting Construction, Operational, and Under Construction.

If we could add a layer giving political features it would show that Tory-voting England is almost entirely free of wind farms.

Below you’ll see an extract from a relevant UK government publication. This makes it clear that the 2015 legislation covered England and Wales.

Obviously, this legislation means there will be hardly any wind farms in England. And that will result in the UK struggling to meet its climate change obligations. It will also be bad news for the Tories’ business friends who milk the subsidies paid for renewable energy.

Which is why I am convinced pressure was applied from London on the ‘Welsh Government’ for Wales to accept more and more wind farms.

This explains why the legislation was reversed in Wales to make wind farms of 10MW Developments of National Significance, meaning local authorities must either grant planning permission or expect to be over-ruled if they refuse planning permission. For the ultimate power rests with Welsh ministers. (Here’s the link.)

This explains how, in 2018, Lesley Griffiths was able to over-rule both Powys County Council and the Planning Inspector on Hendy wind farm.

Ordinarily, Wales and England moving in separate directions would be something I’d applaud, but not this time.

Perhaps someone in the ‘Welsh Government’ can explain why 10MW wind farms are Developments of National Significance in Wales, but not in England.

Especially as we share the same National Grid and the electricity generated by ‘Welsh’ wind farms will most likely go to England.

As I’ve said, I’m convinced pressure was applied from London, perhaps via the civil servants operating in Wales who answer to London. The ‘Welsh Government’ couldn’t admit that, so it was glossed over with the Well-being of Future Generations Act, which came into force in April 2016.

Followed by pious declarations to make Wales ‘carbon neutral’ and then, like a maiden aunt having an attack of the vapours, declaring a ‘Climate Emergency‘.

As if anybody outside of Corruption Bay gives a toss!

These bouts of orchestrated hysteria turned planting wind farms all over Wales into an environmental crusade. The panel below, from this ‘Welsh Government’ site, explains why someone thinks we needed this legislation.

Note that climate change, over which Wales can have no effect, is more important for the ‘Welsh Government’ than spheres where it could make a difference.

Priorities, eh!

◊

CONCLUSION

Despite the apparent divergence of approach over Developments of National Significance in 2015/16 we are, effectively, still in the Englandandwales model.

Making wind farms another example of devolution being used to serve England’s interests rather than ours. Consider this . . .

Just imagine if a Tory government in Westminster had said, ‘We don’t want wind farms in England – so we’re going to dump them all in Wales’. There would have been a national outcry.

Yet that is what has happened!

It’s the old story of Wales being exploited for the benefit of England. And just as with our water, we are not compensated for what we export.

Wanting Wales to be ‘carbon neutral’ and declaring a ‘Climate Emergency!’ is just vain posturing to disguise Wales’ subordinate status. Play-acting that won’t improve the lives of Welsh people, or make any difference to climate change.

And things might be about to get a whole lot worse.

For the number of wind farm applications is accelerating. Not only do we have Bute Energy’s 16 projects, there’s also the monster turbines planned for Y Bryn, between Port Talbot and Maesteg; while more recently I’ve learnt of a plan for turbines above coal tips at Ynyshir in the Rhondda Fach.

Yes, honestly, above coal tips.

How many more are planned that we haven’t yet heard about?

There is nothing to be said in favour of wind turbines. In their brief and intermittent lives they do not repay the environment for the damage caused in making, transporting, and erecting them. They are all built and owned by foreign companies. They provide no jobs. They despoil our landscapes. They kill birds. They cause flooding.

But never mind, we’re serving England’s interests. Again.

♦ end ♦

Arts Council of Wales and Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union, an update

On 31.08.202129.05.2024 By JacIn Colonialism, Corruption, Cymrophobia, Public Funding, Third Sector, Wales, Welsh Government32 Comments

I’M IN SEMI-RETIREMENT AND THIS BLOG IS WINDING DOWN. I INTEND CALLING IT A DAY IN THE NEXT FEW MONTHS. POSTINGS WILL PROBABLY BE LESS FREQUENT AND I WILL NOT UNDERTAKE ANY MAJOR NEW INVESTIGATIONS. DIOLCH YN FAWR.

♦

This is a follow-up to last week’s post, ‘Corruption Bay and a tale of Cymrophobia‘. You’ll remember that we looked at how Labour Party insiders were paid to produce reports that would guide more ‘inclusive’ policy at the commissioning bodies, the Arts Council of Wales and the National Museum.

♦

UPDATE

One of these submissions, from the mysterious Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union, painted a picture of Wales as some kind of Hell on Earth where ‘creatives’ of a non-Caucasian pigmentation are brutally discriminated against.

It was reminiscent of the hysteria I’ve been writing about in connection with YesCymru. Where some of those involved in the failed Woke-Left takeover wanted us to believe that ‘women with penises’ are being butchered on Welsh streets by mobs of transphobes.

What I found revealing was that neither those suggesting rampant transphobia or a whites-only arts scene are prepared to debate. Any dialogue must start from a blind acceptance of their ‘facts’.

A few tit-bits have come to light since the previous post went out. For example, someone drew my attention to the metadata naming authors for the three reports.

The report from Labour insiders Lu Thomas and Jon Luxton named Luxton as the author. But the other two reports listed Arts Council employees as authors. Which might at first sight seem a bit odd, though there could be a simple explanation.

Such as the reports being submitted in MS Word or some other format and the Arts Council converting them to PDF.

If that is not the explanation, then what is?

Despite the ‘authorship’, there is no real issue with the Richie Turner Associates’ report because the contributors are named in the report.

It’s the third report, from the Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union, that’s causing concern. Because no individual or contributor is named anywhere.

Anyway, in the hope of helping me make sense of the bigger picture, a few people made suggestions. Pointed me in certain directions. So off I went.

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NATURE OF THE BEAST

It’s fair to say that Amgueddfa Cymru was almost a ‘passenger’ in this exercise, so I’m ruling them out to focus on The Arts Council of Wales.

The current Chair is Phil George, who I speculated was a Labour Party supporter. His immediate predecessor in the post, from 2007 – 2016, was David Burton Smith, whose political leanings have never been in doubt.

For Dai Smith – father of unsuccessful challenger to Jeremy Corbyn, Owen Smith – is another creature of the left. One of those historians who, like Neil Kinnock, believes Wales isn’t worthy of study until the Industrial Revolution and the creation of a proletariat.

Smith worked for the BBC in Cardiff, from 1994, as, ‘Head of Broadcast (English Language). He was responsible for commissioning programmes on the arts and in drama and has also presented award-winning documentaries on the people and culture of south Wales’.

Through a socialist prism, of course.

An interesting insight into colonial Wales, this. For while the Labour Party rails against Tory cronyism, Old Boy networks and the rest, the Buttybond practises something very similar in Wales.

And the Tories are more than happy to let them do it. I’ll explain why a bit later.

Phil George has a long history with The National Theatre of Wales (NTW). In fact, he was one of the founding directors on September 9, 2008. He seems to have left NTW in March 2016, around the time he was appointed Chair of the Arts Council.

I’m told the National Theatre of Wales was always well favoured in Cardiff. One source reports: ‘”BBC Wales” used and uses every opportunity to promote this company. Hardly any arts documentaries are done but in its formative years, 2010, it commissioned a 30 minute advertorial dressed up as a documentary on a National Theatre production’.

It was thanks to Phil George and NTW that Abdul Shayek of London got his foot in the Welsh public funding door. For Shayek’s Linkedin page tells us that from April 2011 until April 2013 he was a Creative Associate with NTW.

Shayek then branched out to form FIO, a BAME theatre group. Though apparently reliant on funding from the Welsh public purse this didn’t stop FIO taking plays to India. And Shayek ‘representing’ FIO at symposia and the like in Sri Lanka and Australia.

Nice work if you can get it! And especially if someone else is paying.

Another source tells me FIO got some £400,000 in funding over 3 or 4 years. (It might have been more.) Which pays for quite a few trips to Oz and old Serendip.

Going back to Shayek’s Linkedin bio we see that he left FIO in August 2020 to join Tara Theatre. No, this has nothing to do with halls and High Kings, it’s yet another ‘ethnically diverse’ theatre group. This time in London.

I’m not sure of the reasons for Shayek’s departure, or where this leaves his creation, FIO. The website suggests it’s still going, and the Charity Commission entry implies he’s still involved.

Whatever the relationship between Abdul Shayek and FIO he still appears to be involved with the arts scene in Wales. And pissing off quite a few people with his involvement in the Wales Culture and Race Taskforce (WCRT).

Which was set up in June 2020 to, ‘challenge the lack of diversity within the arts in Wales and demand systemic change’.

I’m not sure if this was Abdul Shayek’s brainchild or if he just got involved somehow. Certainly, his creation FIO was holding the money donated to WCRT by other arts groups. Said to be £20,000.

You’ll get a flavour of the dispute from the Critically Speaking blog of Jafar Iqbal. (A supporter of Leyton Orient football club.) In particular, read the lengthy comment from ‘pledging organisations’.

If you want to know more about the role envisaged for the Wales Culture and Race Taskforce then you should read this document prepared for the ‘Welsh Government’.

Strangely, in just 452 words this document manages to use the term ‘white-led’ three times. In the Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union ‘report’ we encounter the phrase ‘white-led’ 10 times.

When checking the metadata for the document I’ve just linked to, I found the author named as Letty Clarke. So obviously, I wondered who she might be.

You will not be surprised to learn that Letty is also from England, but since January 2020 she has been Curator of Public Programmes at Artes Mundi Prize Ltd. From the Artes Mundi website we learn:

‘Artes Mundi Prize Ltd is a registered non-profit charity that annually relies on support from individuals, corporations, sponsors, trusts and foundations to fund the costs of all our programmes, alongside our core public revenue from Arts Council of Wales and Cardiff City Council’.

The name may sound like a character from a forgotten novel set in 19th century New England, but Letty is of the here and now. And, unfortunately, the ‘here’ is Wales.

Letty Clarke’s Linkedin profile makes it clear that she supports Black Lives Matter, and her Twitter account provides a few gems.

As many of you will know, investigations are continuing into the death of Mohamud Mohammed Hassan, who died some hours after leaving police custody. But Letty Clarke, after being in Wales for a short time, has already made her mind up.

For according to her Hassan was a victim of ‘police brutality’ and ‘state violence in Wales’. What the hell does she mean by ‘state violence’? There is no Welsh state!

Let me explain the relationship to you, Letty . . . Your country robs my country and by way of compensation doles out money to those buffoons down Corruption Bay, who in turn distribute far too much of that cash to people like you and your friends.

Which means that, one way and another, most Welsh people get screwed twice over.

Up to now in this painful trawl through the ‘Welsh’ arts scene I don’t think we’ve met anyone who is actually Welsh, apart from a few cocks atop the dung heap.

Let’s see if we have any more luck in the next section.

◊

THE SEARCH CONTINUES FOR THE WELSH ARTS ANTI-RACIST UNION

In December 2019 the Wales Audit Office produced a snappily-entitled report, ‘Well-being of Future Generations Increasing Participation in Areas with Under-developed Reach of the Arts – Arts Council of Wales’. You can read it here.

The Introduction says: ‘This document has been prepared for the internal use of the Arts Council of Wales’. Reminding us that this is an example of the additional public money wasted since the implementation of the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015, and the creation of the post of Future Generations Commissioner, with of course, a whole new department.

The job of Commissioner was given to Labour time-server Sophie Howe. She had previously worked under Alun Michael, the former Labour MP and now Police and Crime Commissioner for South Wales.

Under ‘Contents’ we read: ‘In its efforts to increase participation, inclusion and engagement in areas with under-developed reach of the arts, the Arts Council of Wales (Arts Council) is demonstrating commitment to the sustainable development principle but it recognises the need to further embed the five ways of working.’

Clearly, the Audit Office looked into inclusion in the arts, and made recommendations to the Arts Council. So why, just six months later, did the ACW spaff another £50,000 (minimum) doing what looks like exactly the same thing?

(Note that the Sell2Wales notice I link to is from June 2020. Which is when the Wales Culture and Race Taskforce was set up.)

This duplication produced the three reports dealt with in the previous post, including the submission from the mysterious Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union.

This digression takes us nowhere nearer identifying the person or persons behind the Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union. In fact, it’s difficult to get any handle on the WAARU.

One mention I did find was on what I assume to be a podcast. It seems to be called Mostyn, or Lumin, the latter described as, ‘an artist-run radio and publisher led by Sadia Pineda Hameed and Beau W Beakhouse’.

If you scroll down to the bios of others involved, you’ll see this for the Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union. But again, no name.

I’d like to be able to tell you that Hameed is from Froncysyllte and Beakhouse from Llangyfelach, but alas . . .

Beau tells us: ‘I’m originally from Bournemouth but moved around . . . I come from a nature & craft background . . . My parents were self-employed gardeners, who then went into woodcraft . . . Eventually, I managed to study English Literature at Cardiff University’.

Hameed: ‘I’m from London. I also came to Cardiff to study English Literature at uni and decided to stay ‒ in part because I didn’t really have the money to pursue the arts back in London, but also because I really liked how open the arts scene in Wales is.’

Yes indeedy; the ‘arts scene’ in Wales is open to just about anybody . . . artistic talent is unnecessary, and knowledge of Wales undesirable.

Here’s an example of Beakhouse’s poetry from 2017.

Don’t give up the day job, Beau. Whatever it is.

That we are no nearer fingering who wrote the Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union report is understandable, given its reception. But the Arts Council of Wales must know because the WAARU was paid well to insult us.

Which is why I have submitted a Freedom of Information request to the ACW.

But over and above that, this situation of strangers being paid to insult us could only happen in the peculiar circumstances of devolution, which sees politicians and others who superficially oppose each other agree when it comes to Wales, and the Welsh.

∼

UPDATE: Since publishing this piece I have received feedback, including someone drawing my attention to The Future Generations Report 2020. On page 355 we read what you see in the panel:

I have two points to make.

First, ‘learning Welsh on the job’ sounds like a good idea, until you realise it’s often a ruse to give jobs to people most of whom will do no more than go through the motions of taking a few Welsh lessons.

Mark James, former chief executive of Carmarthenshire County Council, would be a great example of this scam in practise.

Second, The Future Generations Commissioner in her 2020 report is quoting Race Alliance Wales (RAW), a body formally launched on December 19, 2019. How the hell did a newly-constituted body become so influential so quickly?

The answer is that those behind RAW are based almost exclusively in Cardiff and well connected in Corruption Bay.

While organisations elsewhere in Wales, established for far longer, representing many more people, but outside the Bay Bubble, are ignored.

This is not healthy; this is not democratic; this should not be the Wales any of us wants to see.

But it’s the Wales we live in.

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FURTHER UPDATE: Someone else has been in touch with an intriguing suggestion. Which is, that when an anonymous Twitter account is launched the author is often to be found among the early followers.

In the case of the Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union Twitter account the first ten followers can be found here. (Read from the bottom up.) There are quite a few names there that appear in this article.

◊

THE BIT AT THE END WHERE COLOMBO PUFFS ON HIS CIGAR AND . . .

Picking up again on the shared motivations, what I’m hinting at is that these otherwise squabbling interests agree that Wales must be carefully ‘managed’.

Which is why what passes for entertainment on television and elsewhere is banal and superficial. Welsh politics, social issues, and other specifically Welsh matters (when dealt with in English) are often quarantined in programmes broadcast at awkward times . . . which results in hardly anyone watching them.

The same applies more widely, in the fields so copiously manured by the Arts Council. For example, there’s not a hope in Hell of Wales having its own Abbey Theatre.

We are at a stage now where if two plays are in competition for funding, one about Welsh villages being destroyed by excessive tourism, the other about the absence of obstetric facilities for low caste birthing persons in Tamil Nadu, then you can predict with certainty which will enjoy an opening night.

Researching this piece I stumbled on an hour-long lecture by former Arts Council Chair Dai Smith, built around writer Raymond Williams. Smith is speaking at a ‘Cultural Democracy Workshop’ in November 2020.

This was of course delivered at a time when the three reports commissioned by the Arts Council were being prepared. Yes, it was all happening around that time.

Smith makes the point that in the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, when Williams was at the height of his intellectual and creative powers, his writing was framed by what he saw as a class struggle. But things have moved on.

(Interestingly, a piece on Williams appeared in UnHerd yesterday.)

Most importantly, the political left in Europe and North America has lost the working class. Which is why Marxism is now promoted through race, environmentalism and gender. And the harder the left pushes these the more it alienates the working class.

No one living just thirty years ago could have envisioned the crazy situation we have reached today. And few political activists of the left under the age of 40 can believe that their ideological predecessors idolised those they regard as stupid, racist, transphobic, climate denying Brexiteers.

The sons and grandsons of Marxist miners are fascist white van men!

A hazy understanding of Marxism re-interpreted by Black Lives Matter almost certainly lies behind the report submitted by the Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union. It also explains the report’s acceptance by the Arts Council.

But why would the Old Etonians in Westminster and their civil servant alumni of lesser schools want to push such drivel? The answer is that they share with the Woke-Left establishment in Corruption Bay a desired outcome.

This explains the funding and other encouragement for people from around the world to come here, take funding that should go to Welsh arts, and then call us racist.

London likes the ‘The Welsh are racist’ message because it explains why we oppose holiday homes, and resent being colonised. (It’s why the Telegraph used the WAARU report.) Corruption Bay modifies it to read, ‘Nationalism is racist’ because that can slander those suggesting there is a better way for Cymru than devolution’s cronyism and exploitation.

Together they tell us why the ‘Welsh’ arts scene today is a revolting mess of talentless dreamers and grant-grabbing shysters. Overwhelmingly alien; with some of those involved positively racist in their attitudes towards us.

Modern Wales in microcosm.

♦ end ♦

Jac o' the North

Tag: Sophie Howe

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