PLEASE APPRECIATE THAT I GET SENT MORE INFORMATION AND LEADS THAN I CAN USE. I TRY TO RESPOND TO EVERYONE WHO CONTACTS ME BUT I CANNOT POSSIBLY USE EVERY BIT OF INFORMATION I’M SENT. DIOLCH YN FAWR
♦
Yo
u’ll recall that in the post before Easter I reported on ‘Welsh Government’ generosity in Aberteifi. Now another case has been brought to my attention.
This one in Talyllychau, a village not far from Llandeilo, where a gang called Talley Community Amenity Association (TCAA) is lined up for £522,653 from the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’.
You’ll have noticed that in my playful way I just referred to them as a ‘gang’, but they couldn’t really be a gang because one of them is an an ex-copper, who seems to have bought ‘a place in Wales’ and then got a transfer for the final few years of his service.
In fact, many police officers get pre-retirement transfers to Dyfed Powys and North Wales. To which we can add others who get transfers because they can’t cope with the pressure in England’s towns and cities.
And this phenomenon is not confined to the police service, it’s widespread with cross-border employers, Royal Mail would be another example. I wonder how many jobs we Welsh lose due to transferees filling vacancies in scenically attractive parts of the country?
But I digress, let us hie back to Talyllychau.
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WHO ARE THEY AND WHAT DO THEY DO?
In the hope of learning more about Talley Community Amenity Association I turned to documents filed with Companies House. The company was Incorporated 18 July 2002 and gives as its business, ‘Support services to forestry’. The TCAA also registered as a charity – number 1097539 – 15 May 2003, where its ‘Activities’ are listed as ‘Management of local woodland’.
Clearly, TCAA is interested in woodland around Talyllychau, partly explained in a piece by one of the company’s original directors, Stephen Upson. This document also makes clear that TCAA existed in some unspecified form before it became a company and a charity, and that it was in discussions with both Forestry Commission Wales and the Welsh Development Agency to acquire local woodland as a community amenity. (This map might help you better understand the area. The village proper is just visible on the far right centre.)
These negotiations probably explain the need to become registered, for in the first ‘Financial statement’, for 2003, we see that the money is rolling in, and there is now £81,733 in the pot, but no mention of whence it came. Though I couldn’t help noticing that these accounts were prepared by ‘Gray & Associates, Accountancy Services, Talley House, Talley’. This is presumably the Sarah Ellen Gray who became a director of the company on 12 September 2005.
Isn’t this cosy!
The balance sheet for year ending 31 July 2004 shows fixed assets of £64,999, explained as ‘Land sold to the Association by WDA repayable 9 May 2029’. Elsewhere on this filing we read of ‘grant funding’ of £112,021, but again, no clue as to the source of this moolah. But don’t worry, because ‘Grant work completed’ amounts to £111,748, leaving just £273 for tea bags, sugar and biccies.
These second ‘accounts’ – and I use that term loosely – give no indication as to who prepared them, who audited them, who the company’s solicitors are, or its bankers. Talley Community Amenity Association seems to be using every loophole in the Companies Act to give out the bare minimum of information.
The newly-acquired asset is further explained by a Welsh Development Agency charge against TCAA for ‘land at Plas farm’. But by the time we reach the 2008 accounts the £65,000 ex-WDA asset has disappeared. Where’d it go?
Well, according to the title document for ‘Land at Plas farm’ the asset passed into the ownership of the ‘National Assembly for Wales’ 28.03.2007. Which throws up a wee conundrum.
I mean, if the land was returned to the ‘Welsh Government’, or the Notional Assembly, then surely the charge held by the WDA would have been satisfied. Or if the happy band at ‘Talley’ had been paid £65,000 – as the title document suggests – then they would have used that money to pay off the WDA, wouldn’t they?
Yet the charge remains and there is no sign of any income – or little activity of any kind – in the accounts after 2008. The Talley Community Amenity Association has just been ticking over with a few thousand in the bank gaining interest.
Am I missing something in the Plas farm land transfers and sales? Or is something being omitted from the minimalist documents submitted to Companies House?
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THE CAVALRY ARRIVES – IT’S BOOTS AND SADDLES!
A recent addition to the ‘Talley belongs to us’ crew is Angela Gail Hastilow, who seems to have arrived in 2012, along with husband Ian, from West Sussex. The Hastilows are saddle-makers. The firm seems to be still based in England, for the website tells us ‘Angie runs the office from Wales’.
I’d like to refer you now to a document filed with Companies House 27 July 2018 telling us that Angela Gail Hastilow replaced Peter Graham Knott as a ‘person with significant control’ (PSC), which usually means the person running the show.
Let me quote Companies House, which words it thus: ‘A person with significant control (PSC) is someone who owns or controls your company. They’re sometimes called ‘beneficial owners’.’
What is also strange is that this occurred on the same day as Mrs Hastilow became a director. I’m sure there’s no legislation forbidding someone joining a company and becoming the PSC on the same day, but it’s unusual.
The only times I’ve come across it is when someone buys out a company. But Talley Community Amenity Association is not that kind of company; for example, it has no shares to be bought or transferred, so it’s difficult to see how anyone could take it over. Or why it would be allowed.
Yet that’s what Angela Hastilow appears to have done. Not only is she now PSC but the company’s registered office has moved to her house in Talyllychau. And it’s the same with the TCAA charity. Hers is the address and she is the contact for the charity. It appears to be a clean sweep.
This takeover throws up another conundrum. I’ve told you that Hastilow became a director and the person with significant control on 27 July 2018, and yet there is another document filed with Companies House that suggests otherwise.
According to this other form, Hastilow became a/the person with significant control 02 September 2017 . . . before she even became a director!
Of course, it may be a genuine mistake. But if Angela Hastilow did really take the reins in September 2017 how was this achieved without her having any declared links with TCAA?
This anomaly has been reported to Companies House.
And now Talley Community Amenity Association is lined up for £522,653 of our money; and it also looks as if they’re going to be gifted – or at least given control over – 800 hectares of prime Welsh land. That is, land we own.
Yet who can blame them for this very human acquisitiveness, for Talyllychau is an idyllic location. Its has lakes, a ruined abbey, and is reasonably close to the M4; all features that make it very attractive to well-heeled English folk.
And the area around Talyllychau has great tourism potential.
Despite all the talk of ‘biodiversity’ and ‘community benefits’ it is being suggested to me that more mercenary motives may be at work. So before money or land is given to Talley Community Amenity Association certain things need to be established:
- Why are the TCAA accounts so rudimentary and uninformative?
- Where did the £81,733 come from that appears in the 2003 accounts?
- What is the source of the ‘grant funding’ of £112,021 shown in the 2004 accounts?
- For what was this grant funding given and was its spending monitored?
- If the TCAA was paid £65,000 in 2007 for the Plas farm land why didn’t it use that money to clear the WDA debt?
- And if TCAA was paid £65,000 then what happened to the money?
- If the TCAA was not paid £65,000 then by what route did the ‘National Assembly for Wales’ gain the land?
- How was it possible for Mrs Angela Gail Hastilow to become the ‘person with significant control’ of TCAA before she’d even become a director?
- Does Mrs Angela Gail Hastilow now control TCAA?
- If so, how did this come about?
- What are the terms under which the 800 hectares mentioned in the newspaper report will be made available to TCAA?
- Will the 800 hectares remain in public ownership if this project goes ahead?
- Will the directors and trustees of TCAA be allowed to use the land to further their own business interests?
- If this project proceeds will the ‘Welsh Government’ require TCAA to produce full and independently audited annual accounts available for public scrutiny?
- How representative of the wider community is TCAA?
- Why is there so little Welsh involvement in TCAA?
BOTTOM LINE: Why is the ‘Welsh Government’ paying wealthy outsiders to take over publicly-owned Welsh land that they will almost certainly use to make money for themselves?
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PART OF A PATTERN
Returning to the article that appeared last week in the South Wales Guardian we read that the scheme delivering the loot and the land is ‘the Sustainable Management Scheme (SMS)’, administered by the Welsh Government Rural Communities – Rural Development Programme’.
This scheme can be traced back to 2013 when then Minister for Natural Resources and Food, Alun Davies, acting under orders from ‘his’ civil servants, transferred 15% of EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) funding from Pillar 1 (farmers) to Pillar 2 (‘rural development projects’).
Despite the order coming from London, via its Wales-based civil servants, ‘Welsh’ Labour enthusiastically endorsed this diktat and justified the decision by waffling about ‘biodiversity’, ‘sustainability’, ‘parsnip trees’, etc.
For the bruvvers had already been moving in that direction by becoming the first administration on Earth to surrender to a rabble of hippies by implementing the One Planet legislation in 2011. Since when things have snowballed.
Next came the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 with a Future Generations Commissar. And as I mentioned at the top, before Easter I reported on the ‘Welsh Government’ ‘selling’ five acres of good land on the outskirts of Aberteifi for just £1 to yet another a bunch of ‘Gimme! Gimme!’ Greens.
Though I’m pleased to report that resistance to this invasion is growing. People are angry that the planning regulations they must abide by can be flouted with impunity by people they are funding!
Resistance encouraged by those with designs on our country over-reaching themselves with their Summit to Sea extravaganza, a vast project that has George Monbiot and his playmates hoping to take over 10,000 hectares of land (and even more of sea!)
The Rewilding Britain website tells us that its partner in Summit to Sea is the Woodland Trust. To understand the quintessentially colonialist nature of this project listen to Natalie Buttriss, the Woodland Trust’s Director of Wales, speaking about the project on BBC Radio 4’s ‘Farming Today’ programme.
Or watch Rebecca Wrigley, Director of Rewilding Britain.
The attitude of these latter-day memsahibs is clear – ‘If the locals don’t like our plans then they can jolly well fuck off’. (From their own country.)
The truth must be faced that we have reached a stage where things done in the name of ‘Wales’ that are antithetical to the interests of the Welsh. Which in turn reveals, among other things, that devolution is nothing more than a confidence trick that allows our masters to filter their colonialist ambitions through their local management team.
This ‘Welsh Government’ is only too willing to comply because ‘Welsh’ Labour hates country people, and especially indigenous country people; with hairy-arsed, Welsh-speaking rustics being the favoured targets down at the Lord Tonypandy Memorial Firing Range. (Garters optional.)
And because it’s a party of very woke and posturing planet-savers Plaid Cymru will support Monbiot and his memsahibs against Welsh farmers and the interest of the nation.
Everywhere we look we see Welsh people being elbowed out of attractive localities like Talyllychau. And as locals are squeezed out they are replaced by white flighters and good-lifers, grant grabbers, retirees and the human detritus of urban England. (This last category brought in by our housing associations.)
With these incomers funded with hundreds of millions of pounds that for some reason was never available for locals.
As we approach the third decade of the twenty-first century there’s a welcome in the hillsides for just about anybody . . . except us. Last year I reminded you of the term coined by Martiniquais poet and political activist Aimé Césaire to describe this phenomenon, it was ‘genocide by substitution’.
This is exactly what we see happening in Wales today – a deliberate and systematic strategy of replacing one people with another. A bloodless form of ethnic cleansing.
♦ end ♦
Well at many events people are invited to speak. If not invite yourself to speak, take bull horn and carry on.
Is that the advice of an activist or an agent provocateur ? Until I know you better I will refrain from brining my bullhorn to any party. Others may not be so concerned and will act anyway.
I can vouch for him.
good !
It says All Under One Banner. All who support independence should attend and be prepared to speak. Policies of the new independent state will be decided by the government elected by the Welsh people after independence.
Plenty of people “prepared to speak” but apparently not invited to speak ! What do you suggest – should an alternative event take place ? That again falls into the old cythrel y canu tradition.
Dennis Morris tweets about the loss of council tax revenue from secondhomes/holiday lettings. Those holiday lettings could be clamped by slapping a residential rating AND a business rate on them. Simply, they are residential because people live in them from week to week often “out of season” as well as for the duration of the so called holiday season. And the business rate should apply because it’s by definition a money making venture. Nothing complicated about that, is there ?
If the ass-holes who buy and let out these properties start whining about not making enough profit well tough shit they should have found something else to venture into rather than pricing genuine residential buyers out of these markets.
Dafis – I think we’re missing an opportunity. Premium council tax on second homes in Wales should be abolished. It’s crude and ineffective. It should be replaced with the secondary residence premium and based on the income tax code.
All income tax payers with a main residential address in Wales now have a “C” prefix. For example, my tax code is C1250L. The “C” is for Cymru, the 1250 represents £12500 tax-free allowance, and the “L” means I don’t have dependent children. It there is a household in Wales that is not resident for purposes of income tax, the “C” missing, then the 1250 can be added as a premium of £1250 to the council tax bill at the beginning of the year. This also diverts the holiday home owner from the avoidance practice of registering the holiday property as a ‘small business” exempt from council tax altogether, because what they will do is register their Welsh address as their main residence. This would mean the whole of their primary earnings (in England) would be collected in Wales, a proportion of which does not go via London, and directly into the Welsh budget. It’s also easier to administer, a council just needs to cross reference income tax codes to main residencies, and apply the premium where “C” is absent.
An English person with a second home in Wales is charged a premium of £1250pa. If they designate the Welsh address as the main home (the avoidance loophole), then ALL of their income tax is paid in Wales. This is more than £1250, paid directly to the Welsh budget. It’s also a way to stop the ‘Welsh clearances’ in Fro Gymraeg where children get a decent job in Cardiff or ‘away’. They can remain a Welsh taxpayer. So when parents die they are not forced to sell the ‘family home’ and there’s the option to remain as primary occupancy with a “C” tax code, which never attracts the premium. Keeps existing Welsh owned houses in the hands of Welsh people.
Easy to administer too. Every council has a list of residential addresses and the tax code of the occupant can be downloaded from HMRC. If the ‘C’ is missing, then the premium applies.
My above suggestion has prompted the question of ‘Is that legal?”
Yes!
IF, we remain part of the EU. There is case law. Sweden had a problem with wealthy Danes pricing out Swedes on coastal villas near Malmö. They wanted access to Danish citizen tax codes to lever additional municipal tax. Was it allowed? Sweden won the Öresund Bridge Hoppers case in the European Court. They also one a similar case with Finland in the far north where there was an “insulation tax” to bring second homes up to energy standard. Although these cases was won, they may have to collect it in Euros rather than Kroner.
If we get a Welsh government who’s prepared to act we would have to:
(a) Stand in the Senedd and tell Helen Mary Jones that she cannot access the ladies toilet and has to go use the gents. Although she may identify as female she looks like a fat bloke. So stop pissing about attacking Welsh citizens.
(b) Suggest the removal of the ethnic throw from the neck of Bethan Jenkins. White girls who marry a Bollywood stars do not automatically become oppressed. She can replace it with my IFK Göteborg scarf.
(c) Take a barrow full of radioactive Cardiff mud up to Bryngwran and tell Rhun ap Iorwerth he can add it to his veggie patch and grow Moron Wylfa.
(d) Give away a free train ticket to Leanne Wood outside the Womens Cooperative centre in Islington, so she can return to campaign for the community allotments in Blaenllechau, where she’s needed.
I’m sure Max Andersson MEP and Jill Evans MEP would be very willing to give evidence to the Senedd committee.
If they say it’s not within the powers of local authorities to draw such arbitrary boundaries, I can then show them a video of Mark James driving into the Nantycaws recycling centre being turned away by his own contractors after verification of his registered home address. I think he was told to return to the main road to turn right until he sees the sign saying “Croeso i’r Ddinas Gaerdydd”, to recycle his laylandii cuttings. It’s written on his driving license.
I wonder if Adam will look at my suggestion? If we remain in the EU we do it on Welsh terms, not what London tells us.
This is an incredible suggestion, Brychan. I love it. But we can guarantee the tourist industry will oppose it because they’ll argue it will be ‘bad for tourism’. The ‘Welsh Government’ will go along with that because they have no interest in doing what’s best for Wales.
This suggestion needs a wider audience so can I float it on Twitter?
Personally I have no problem with any configuration that makes owners pay a fair share for services ( certainly don’t condone using services without paying for them), and , an additional valuation which compensates that local community for the disruptive effects of second home/holiday lets and tourism in general. Indeed given that tourism is coming to be seen as an extractive industry with locals at best getting odd supervisory jobs while revenue and profits get siphoned off to other side of Clawdd Offa this kind of regime must come into force a.s.a.p
Reading your Tweets column this morning I get the impression that the Saturday March is beginning to fall foul of the old Welsh “cythrel y canu”. Not surprising therefore that some inner circle gets to decide who gets to sign a song and in which tune. This is the kind of behaviour which replicates the centralist orthodoxy that runs like a bad stain through much of Welsh public life. I was minded to attend but on reflection a couple of hours watching Leinster vs Saracens might be better for my mental health and B.P. !
Seriously though if yet another initiative gets fouled up by the pseudo-nationalist thought police then I think I will turn my back on the whole show. Connolly’s advice to his colleagues still rings true today. Some might say well there’s nowhere else to go, I beg to differ but that will be a touch more covert. We’ll know by the end of the week whether the movement is moving forwards or has taken the usual diversion up its own arse.
The impression given was the All Under One Banner march was open to all those who believe in Welsh independence. Now we know it’s not because Ein Gwlad is not wanted.
This is because the march is organised by the precious progressives who form little groups to promote Plaid Cymru. Did you know there was a group called Awoken Cymru? I didn’t until this week. They will have a spokesperson at the AUOB march but Ein Gwlad will not.
An excuse given is that Ein Gwlad has a bad reputation in certain quarters. Yes, it does, and that reputation has come about through constant attacks by the same people organising Saturday’s march.
Yet the organisers have stated that they would like to have had the Green Party there. That is the same Green Party that last year rejected a proposal to form a separate Welsh Green Party. A decision that resulted in the local leader joining Plaid Cymru.
Put it all together and it tells me that if this march is about independence then those attending will only have independence on their terms, as recently spelled out by Undod. And many may not even want independence, they just want to bring ‘progressives’ together to have a collective moan about Farage and the price of lentils.
You’ve accurately pinpointed the weak link in the chain Dafis, and your description of it: “like a bad stain through much of Welsh public life” is a quaint way of stating the unsavoury truth. But it IS the truth.
At a time when our nation needs to pull together – regardless of tit’s individual citizen’s political leanings, or disagreements on home turf policies, there is a really stubborn stain that needs bleach.
The fact of the matter is that some put their political ideology first and the independence struggle second. Statements like ‘we will only support independence, if after independence, we adopt socialist policies’ lets the cat right out of the bag. These are quasi patriots, who only want independence to further their political ideology.
Sadly it appears that this group, in various guises, are attempting to hijack the whole independence movement. They are even brazen enough to cherry pick who should have a key role in the Independence march on Saturday. Shunning the ones who are doing the donkey work in changing the face of Wales – by demanding independence – whilst waving on those who have a hidden agenda that revolves around socialist, progressive liberal ideology. Their excuse? They only invited political party speakers who’s party holds seats in government! In a word – BULLSHIT!
At Ein Gwlad we are determined to put this poisonous, old fashioned political ideology and the nonsense of political labelling – through the dying concept of the left/ right paradigm – to rest for good. Our slogan:
“Not left, not right just Welsh”
Is a serious attempt at achieving this.
Sadly some other so called (socialist) nationalists don’t understand this. Their whole energy is directed into progressing their archaic understanding of modern politics. As have been the characteristics of this mob for over a hundred years, they only see the divisions based on differences in political ideology, instead of getting on with the job of doing what’s best in the interests of Wales and her citizens. Political ideology and doctrines (based on dinosaur principles laid down by the English establishment a long time ago and which are unfit for purpose) comes first to them. Unfortunately many of these brainwashed zombies walk amongst us!
If they are not careful, they will put such a huge stain on the garment that it will have to be thrown away. They just can’t get their heads around co-operativeness – for fear of their ideology losing ground.
We’ve all heard of Aesop’s Fable about ‘the dog in the manger’ haven’t we?
Too true, these ideological fashionistas think they have a monopoly on virtue and good sense. Elsewhere, on IMJ’s Nation.Cymru, a soundbite warrior, Emyr Gruffydd, a member of Plaid Jugend’s Praetorian Guard, was taking the piss out of Max W and Anne Greagsby. I loaded a snippet just advising them to put it down to where it came from. So back comes the irritating squirt hailing me with the usual pseudosocialist, issue-enriched load of old bollocks about me being out of date by a few centuries. Sadly my response which just questioned his maturity and absence of rational argument was mysteriously removed within minutes !
To date I have found NationCymru an open forum often frequented by irritating esoteric idealists but in amongst it all you do get some good valid stuff from all points of the sphere of politics. However in the lead up to this bit of a show on Saturday I think the pseudo-left have gone flat out to shut out the likes of EG and indeed anything else that might not conform to their template. It would be interesting to see something like Feminists or Lesbians for Indy line up on the day as most likely the Trans lobby would get into a huge militant huff ( directed by you know who ! ) as it offends Dames with Cocks and Blokes with Tits (or whatever they call themselves these days).
This spat with AUOB is just the latest in a series of run-ins I’ve had with the same people. (And it is the same people, with a few new and immature additions.) I’ve written about them time and time again on this blog. They can’t change.
Just before the EU elections I think I’ll really wind them up by saying I’ll vote for Farage’s gang.
Should cause a few flutters in the salons, and all the bile flying around could sour the lattes! Poor dears.
One of the key features of the AUOB in Scotland is that it was inclusive. It included SNP, Greens, SSP, Labour4Indy, CND and various other ‘independents’. A whole host of speakers were/are invited at the rallies. The largest indy organisation in Scotland is the SNP and they never saw the other strands as a threat, indeed they welcomed them as they saw it as an opportunity to reach other sections of Scottish society with the message for independence.
I wonder why Plaid Cymru doesn’t see the same opportunity.
Of course there are political differences, this was seen in Scotland. The place for debate on these issues is at the national parliament. Most notable contention was the SNPs policy of membership of NATO, contrary to those from CND. There was also some disagreement on issues such as oil policy and the greens. There was also disagreement on the EU between the SNP and the SSP. This does not mean that a party or organisation is banned from fielding speakers. If AUOB Cymru is being politically sectarian on this matter, then it’s doomed to fail in it’s aim to raise the consciousness for independence in all sections of Welsh society.
Just to put this underhanded bullshit into perspective, here’s a copy of a spat on the subject lifted off social media. I think the contents should put things in perspective.
Lee Felton is our national secretary, I don’t know who Owain Cyfenw is, but he’s obviously on the ball.
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Owain Cyfenw: You invited Plaid Cymru, Labour for Indy, and Undod, have you invited anyone from Ein Gwlad? If not, why not?
AUOB Cymru: Thanks for the message Owain. All who support an independent Wales are welcome, and encouraged, to join us at the march on Saturday! It was decided at our first meeting not to invite political parties to be part of the organsing, therefore only groups are listed as supporters. You can find a list of these groups in the description of this page. It was decided to invite the leaders of the political parties at the Senedd to say a few words at the end of the march if they so wish to explain their support – or opposition – to Welsh independence. Labour declined, Plaid Cymru accepted the others didn’t respond. Smaller parties such as the Green Party and Ein Gwlad who currently have no representation at the Senedd were not invited this time. YesCymru, Labour 4 Indy Wales and Undod are 3 of the groups who support the march. We are working non stop to get as many people as possible to march in Cardiff on Saturday therefore it can take a while to respond. Thanks for your support.
Owain Cyfenw: Of course Labour and the conservatives didn’t accept. They are against Welsh independence. When you say “3 of the groups who support the march”, what does that mean? Are you saying that Ein Gwlad does not support the march? Did they offer their support? Did you ask for their support?
Owain Cyfenw: I had no ideas that I was supporting a march for “all” that would actually be confined to asking for speakers from a small clique of groups- [with the make up of that group decided by who, and when? But immaterial anyway]. This is meant to be “all” under one banner. Saying “anyone can turn up” to the march is not the same thing, when you have introduced speakers, and are confining those speakers to a self-defined selection of groups. This is not good.
Lee Felton Yes we did, three times our communications officer sent an email and several messages via twitter by another member of our steering comittee, All ignored unfortuntely!
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The light is getting brighter isn’t it?
Gee Typical behaviour from an insular wanker who’s more concerned with keeping his little showpiece “clean” rather than pulling together a diverse crew of disparate ideologies but like minded in their quest for liberation. How have we come to this ? What looks like an entire generation of folk totally warped by fashionable ideas, daft theories and probably too much stuff up their noses.
I guess it’s going to be a long march to freedom after all. If I could be bothered I’d go back to that old book about Mao that I read decades ago. I’m not likely to go full-on communist but I always admired the man’s sheer drive and bloody mindedness.
It’s come to this, because of ‘dog in the manger’ attitudes within Plaid, coupled to a lot of jealousy, because of the way we have progressed – as we prophesied we would, months before we officially formed. Remember Gandhi’s wise words?
“First They Ignore You, Then They Laugh at You, Then They Attack You, Then You Win”
Only in our case the laughter came first, when we declared our intentions, along with a cartful of lies and false assumptions and groundless accusations against us. When they realised how serious we were and how sensible our policies are they started to get panicky. Then they ignored us, now they’re about to fight us and then we win! The telling thing is how the attacks have gone quiet, because as time moves on the ridiculous lies are being exposed, and there’s a lot of embarrassment in certain quarters as we’ve highlighted the neurotic and insane things that they said about us. We even had one woman quip “how can you take them seriously – they haven’t even got a decent website”! Well I think our string of sites including our extremely popular News Portal has put every other political party to shame – and we only launched nine months ago. It highlights how we think laterally and do things differently, and these dinosaurs of the past can’t cope or keep up with it.
The really pathetic bit was that during his leadership campaign Pricey Boy was stealing our clothes like there was no tomorrow! He gorged himself on our proposed policies – which backfired, because it really brought independence to the fore, and obviously helped raise our profile amongst those who were less politically savvy. Remember this is the guy, when asked on air if he considered himself a nationalist or a socialist said that he viewed himself as a socialist first and a nationalist second! I rest my case.
It seems that they are up a blind alley, so they try and isolate us – for absolutely no reason, except that they are fresh out of ammo and are milling around pretending we don’t exist!
The good thing about this is that by their actions their petticoats are showing, and slowly but surely people are twigging to the fact that they are not what they seem i.e. a gang of socialist ‘progressive’ liberals trying their best to sabotage things by taking over control of the independence campaign.
It won’t work, because the mask is slipping, and the genuine ones within their ranks (and there are many of them) are slowly but surely seeing the real picture and realising that the guy next to them who is shouting for independence is actually an imposter, whose only goal is to further the doctrines and ideology of the Marxist Culture and progressive liberalism.
Truth, sincerity and honesty will always win the day against the political establishment – as we can see across Europe with the rise of the Nationalist Populist parties who are driving eight inch nails into the coffin of the old establishment parties.
So don’t despair Dafis, just a few little teething problems – that’s all – which we can easily handle.
Having read elsewhere about the Guardian’s ultra corporatist ownership clique, it becomes even more important that Guardian pet scribe George Monbiot is prevented from realising his wet dream by hijacking large tracts of working Welsh countryside and turning them into retreats for pleasure seeking elite cliques. Under normal circumstances such deviants are not welcome, Where they threaten livelihoods, cultures and ways of life they become a real enemy to be met with an extreme response. Get it George ?
On the subject of “Summit to Sea”.
Here is a video of the most successful re-wilding project in Wales. It has had no public funding since the start of the project. In the last 30 years has been transformed from a landscape devoid of all biological life to the most bio-diverse habitats in the whole of the United Kingdom. If fact, recent surveys by Natural Resources Wales have discovered insects previously thought extinct, and an self sustaining eco-system to rival anywhere in Europe.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GplZHxxXIm0{removetoplay}
So why is it that myself, and others who once worked there, have to pay tax on their pensions in order to fund wealthy English people to dictate to farmers in north Wales how to do this re-wilding stuff? Maybe it would be better to use this very same cash to refund the pension fund that was robbed to finance the lifestyle they became accustomed to, before arriving in Wales.
My understanding of ‘rewilding’ is to abandon something and let Nature reclaim it, naturally. As we see in that video. And then last week we read about the ‘Maerdy Monster’. On land that has been left to Nature.
But that’s not what Monbiot and the memsahibs have have in mind; in reality, what they want is to replace Welsh livestock farmers with another kind of land management. ‘Rewilding’ is just a label misleadingly applied to disguise what’s really happening.
My ears pricked up when I heard this mentioned on the BBC Wales radio the other morning when I got into the car, but as usual the item was not discussed further, Sacks and Garside continued to trot out the usual gossip ridden topics with no more journalism than a Hello magazine of individualistic stories trauma to a fat woman who couldn’t fit her arse into a bus seat and is now emotionally scarred for life. If its not that then its recordings of Neil Warnock CCFC or reporting to death the story of the Argentinian footballer killed in the airplane crash in the channel. If the gave half their time to more newsworthy stories on a national Welsh perspective, like this one then people might actually start to wake up and give a shit.
English culture is that of superiority, that of “class” and it manifests itself in colonialism and empire. Get the navvies and blacks to build the infrastructure at home, and when abroad an Englishmans place is that of owner, ruler, and civilizer. In reality, these examples are an aspiration of the English upper middle classes of the shires to obtain landed status in the dominions, something they were culturally deprived of since the Normans. It’s what they expect as they were ‘born to rule’. Ask an Englishman what he does and he’ll say what he ‘owns’.
Welsh culture, that of other Celtic nations, and that of nations that have won independence, is a culture of meritocracy. Hard work makes wealth. It is a culture of cooperation, innovation and survival. It’s a culture that pre-dates the modern era, and goes back to industrial, and pre-industrial times. Ask a Welshman what he does for a living and he’ll name the trade.
https://youtu.be/jO548TY53x4{removetoplay}
The culture.
The thing about ‘rural payments’ is that if it’s a subsidy gone into farming then in return we get cheap food. Divert that subsidy into schemes of land grabbing and grants to outsiders and there is no justification. The station of the Welshie is to wash mountain bikes, change the pillow covers in the yurt, or groom the horse for his master. It is the policy of the Welsh Government. The Labour Party are no longer the politics of liberating the workers, it’s the party of bettering a clique of colonial administrators. Elevation to the status of commissioner.
Why is there a dearth of indigenous crooks and shysters? Is it a function of the natives not having access to info on potential fiddles like outsiders seemingly do? Or is it a function of Welsh poverty in a general sense ensuring that few natives ever gather enough seed money to get such scams off the ground?
It could come down to honesty. Not that we are more honest than the English but that a great number of those I write about seem to have moved to Wales because they’ve heard about the opportunities for milking the public purse with few questions asked.
So, once again it comes down to the numbers. On a law of averages there are 18 English crooks to every Welsh 1, and with a complaisant regime we are easy pickings.
Has anyone done an audit of ‘Welsh’ organisations in terms of who are the movers and shakers, and where they come from – as well as their ability to speak Cymraeg? I don’t think I’d be pushing it too far in hazarding a guess that all the key institutions in our small country are run by monoglot English people. As Dafis, I have no objections whatsoever about people moving here and integrating, i.e. respecting what is here and where relevant, learning Cymraeg – to fluency if they are either heading or high up in rank in the organisations that administer so much of our daily life.
I would think that most of us are aware that most of the heritage sector is very much ‘district commissioner’ land; most of the regional archaeological trusts are stuffed full of people who won’t pronounce our place names with any degree of accuracy, (indeed in one blog post, Rhys Mwyn commented on the lack of Cymraeg speakers in the sector – he is one of the very rare exceptions). Dyfed Archaeological Trust even goes as far as declaring that whilst it respects the language, all internal documents will be in English – in an area where a majority speak Cymraeg. The Royal Commission on Ancient Monuments (Wales) is also top-heavy with those from without our border, and so are a number of other publicly funded organisations, such as Cyfoeth Naturiol Cymru.
When will it be that in areas where 40% or more of the population are speakers of Cymraeg it becomes a statutory requirement that publicly funded organisations operate internally through Cymraeg?
Indeed, isn’t it time that a long-term plan was put in place to ensure that all our public sector will require Cymraeg in order to be able to work in an internal environment operating in the language? It won’t stop people from outside of Cymru from going for these jobs, and nor should it but I think it’s pretty certain that it’ll discourage many applicants who really have the wrong kind of attitude. I’m sure my idea here will be shouted down by some as ‘racist’ though I find it very hard to see how it can be that when it’s an essential skill to be able to do a job in this country – and anyone can learn a language..
Groups like the TCAA present a different problem, and probably a far more insidious one too. As charities, they will be somewhat insulated from criticism as most people buy into the idiocy that charity is a good thing in and of itself – however, any more than cursory consideration of the Third Sector, (as Jac often points out) leaves one with a distinct impression that most of the sector is corrupt, not to mention incompetent as well. I was not surprised to see that the TCAA website is in English only, and where any Cymraeg has been used at all, it is subservient to ‘yr iaith fain’. It also uses a .co.uk domain, rather than a .cymru – again, to me an indication of where allegiances lie. How many more such organisations exist in OUR country? We know about TCAA and, of course CAT, but I’m sure there are many others, all of them fundamentally colonialist and alien.
I have in the past suggested that the greatest achievement of devolution is to have created thousands of jobs and other opportunities for the English middle class.
I think it was happening long before devolution, but once devolution occurred, the slow trickle became a torrent. I don’t know about you Jac, but I never had great expectations from devolution, even though I campaigned hard for it, whilst being very aware that what we were being offered in 1997 was no different to what was offered in 1979. Devolution merely offfered us a talking shop, or a super council, and it was always only going to be a sop to keep Welsh Labour happy. I’m not really disappointed with the way that Labour has performed, but I am very unhappy with the way that Plaid has not just allowed them to get away with it, but often enabled it. Added to this is the distinct lack of a national media to hold our politicians to account, and a huge amount of ignorance about the way that our country is administered. I wouldn’t have expected many to know who is responsible for things like energy policy, but when more than half the population doesn’t know that Cardiff Bay is responsible for running the NHS here it becomes a bit worrying.
The problem with devolution is that it has created a Cardiff Bay Bubble in which politicians and civil servants are influenced by lobbyists and special interest groups to the detriment of most parts of Wales and the great majority of the population. And this goes on unchecked because the ‘Welsh Government’ refuses to have a register of lobbyists – at the insistence of the lobbyists!
Wales is corrupt, and this corruption helps keep Labour in power. Plaid Cymru would be no great improvement, and might even make things worse. Because if Plaid was in power the third sector might be even more favoured than it is now, and land grabbers like George Monbiot and the memsahibs would be gifted half of Wales.
And yet, because they see themselves as ‘progressive’, doing the right thing, they never question their beliefs and never consider the damage they cause. This is a form of fanaticism, and fanaticism always ends badly.
Here’s one. A landlords right to ‘appoint and remove directors’, the ‘Groom lady’ is from Oxfordshire.
https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/08921643/persons-with-significant-control
They’ve just changed the name from Ynghyd CIC to ‘Kidwelly Hub’, using the English only name for the town and now they’ve appointed a Labour Councillor, who came with a £2100 grant from the town council. Then they put up the town council tax precept up to pay for it. The same year as they denied a £100 for the local youth club.
Labour councillors imposing huge tax increases on the locals to hand over grants and property to wannabe English gentry while making the children of the town sit in wooden sheds with a leaking roof.
Welcome back Jac after your well earned break. 16 excellent questions there regarding TCAA. I’m sure the answers are on the way to you on a post card !
I’m not holding my breath!
Thanks for that Jac. I have written previously about the changing nature of migrants. There was a time, not too long ago when families came to Wales to work or take on a farm and INTEGRATED steadily into their communities. Kids went on to learn some Welsh, some very fluent and the whole thing seemed pretty much free of friction.
Now we get a wave of migrants most of whom are totally indifferent to the old established native characteristics and some of whom are here to DOMINATE, uneasy with anything that is remotely identifiable as Welsh. These are the schemers who will manipulate in anyway possible to take possession as “possessing” is central to their makeup. Colonists in everything they do and say. They come in many guises but the common theme is visible for those of us sufficiently alert to see it.
So Drakeford, Cairns and their assorted servants may pass it off as progress but we can’t let ourselves be mugged by these crooked scammers.
And thanks to social media and various networks the word gets out – ‘Wales is a soft touch, come and get your slice!’.
If not Labour or Plaid, who will stand up for y werin-bobl ?
Implicit in your question is acceptance that both Labour and Plaid Cymru have failed. That’s a start.
… or a dead end?