Old Colwyn (East) Residents’ Association
Minute of a Talk to the Open Meeting Wednesday 10th September 2008 by Darren Millar, Assembly Member for Clwyd West and Assembly Shadow Minister for the Environment and Planning.
The Chair welcomed Darren and thanked him for attending the meeting to discuss issues of interest to residents.
Darren responded thanking the association for the opportunity to attend, he commented that he knew how active the association is as he gets regular emails from the secretary and he is aware that the Councillors are appreciative of the work done by members.
He introduced himself as the local Assembly Member for the area of Clwyd West which extends from Rhos on Sea to Kinmel Bay on the coast, then swathes down to Cerrig y Drudion and Pentrefoelas in the south and right across to Loggerheads on the outskirts of Mold and Llandegla on the outskirts of Wrexham on the eastern side of the constituency. The Bay of Colwyn is the largest center of population in the area but also Towyn, Abergele, Kinmel Bay and Ruthin, are all large centres of population.
Darren commented that it is quite a formidable area but added to that Colwyn gets its share of his attention due to emails from the association.
He is a former Towyn Town Councillor and represented the Ward of Towyn on the County Borough Council. He knows all the Councillors personally and noted that many were present at the meeting.
He was elected to the Assembly in May 2007 and his role in the Assembly is Shadow Minister for the Environment and Planning and takes a particular interest in those areas whilst in Cardiff whilst representing constituents’ views on all sorts of different matters.
He said that he wished to update people on three areas in the Assembly which he felt they would find of interest.
1. Health ~ There is a big reorganisation currently taking place in the NHS in Wales and he wishes to know if residents are having any negative experiences as a result. High quality services are a necessity and he fears that the reorganisation has distracted the managers of the NHS. That is not the case with doctors and nurses however. The following matters are regular features in his postbag.
· Access to GPs
· Access to certain medication
He said that the changes, revolve mainly around the abolition of Local Health Boards which were set up a few years ago, to last for a generation supporting the NHS and providing better services for the people of Wales.
What we have seen is huge sums of money spent on administration in the NHS and a postcode lottery in Wales. LHBs have to authorise the use of certain drugs, there are 22 different boards and as many different decisions being made about availability of drugs. He said that he is pleased to see the end of LHBs.
The local Conwy and Denbighshire NHS Trust has been merged with North East Wales NHS Trust and will also be merged with the North West Wales NHS Trust soon. He had welcomed it as it will streamline some management costs but has concerns that we must not see our services moving further east or west. We are served very well by a local hospital in Bodelwyddan. There is always a risk because the bigger centre of population is over in the Wrexham area, that we may lose some of our important services. Darren said that he will campaign to retain them. All problems should be reported to Darren’s’ constituency office.
Darren spoke about the change of heart experienced by the Health Minster Edwina Hart after committing herself over the centralisation of Neurosurgery for Welsh people to South Wales. There is a Centre of Excellence in Neurosurgery in Walton. South Wales by contrast is a 4 hour trip and not a pleasant one for people who are well. Also a problem exists over accommodation costs for persons visiting and so on.
There was a cross party campaign on that issue involving local AMs, MPs and local Councillors. An interim report was produced, after an expensive review which said that people in North Wales should not have to travel down to South Wales. She accepted the recommendations in the review reversing the decision.
She also said that she would like to invest in improved neurosurgery facilities in North Wales whilst maintaining the relationship with the North West of England. For lower level surgical procedures she intends to introduce something in the North Wales area. Darren said that he is campaigning to have it locally, in the centre of North Wales.
He went on to say that since the new Assembly Government has been formed as a coalition of Labour and Plaid Cymru, there has been a change of attitude towards working with public services in England. One of the parties has an ideological problem with one of the parties not wanting to work with our partners in England.
2. Housing ~ He referred to Cllr Bob Squire and his work with this particular issue. He continued to say that there have been massive problems in the area, particularly in terms of local people being able to access local housing and the affordability of the housing.
The UK Government applying to the housing market in England have made some recent announcements about stamp duty and some other support to assist people with affordable housing. Stamp duty is the only part that will apply in Wales. Darren expressed his concern that this will have a negative impact on the number of persons living in Wales especially in the border areas. He stated his intention to ask questions of the Minister on the matter following the Assembly recess to establish what she intends to do to “level the playing field” and give people living in Wales the same support as those living in England.
Daren spoke about a meeting that he had with Cllr. Bob Squire and the Housing Minister, earlier in the year in Colwyn Bay to talk about the local housing needs in this area. They spoke of problems experienced as a community with people relocating into the area very often with social problems and receiving priority in terms of local registered social housing, from registered social landlords, such as the Council and other people.
Much of the problems there revolves around a thing called the Priority Needs Order which gives certain categories of persons priority over those people who may have been on housing lists for 8 or 9 years in our area, who will never be offered a house as there are always people who are going to get priority above them, even though new to the area. He described it as a major issue and said he was pleased that the Minister was very receptive to the message given to her in that meeting. She has said that she will review the system particularly what is called the local connection and the points system around a local connection where points are awarded to someone according to the length of stay that they have had in the area before they are able to access a house. Darren said that he will keep the Association aware of developments via the secretary.
3. Education ~ Darren pointed out that from September this year, there is a brand new thing being introduced to primary schools in Wales called Foundation Phase. This is about learning through play and not desk oriented work that was traditional. It has been welcomed he said by teaching professionals and experts and all the political parties. There was a big problem with the funding for the project. Some of the local schools have had to cut back on staffing resources for their class rooms. That has had a major impact on a lot of school budgets in Conwy where the shortfall was about £350,000. 00. Darren said that he has been making lots of representations, trying to get an increased allocation of support for our schools in the area.
The Local Authority is currently undertaking a review or modernisation of education in Conwy particularly around the capacity of schools and the number of pupils who are currently on school rolls. It is unlikely he said that any schools will be affected by this in Old Colwyn he said, there was quite a significant negative response to the original news that was emanating from the Council that some small schools were going to have to close. Because that is now back out to consultation in terms of the new program, we must be careful to ensure that other schools are not named on the list, that bigger schools are not forced to close to feed the smaller schools and we then have a battle then about local schools in Old Colwyn.
4. An email which Darren had received today gave five points to think about.
Firstly, Darren commented that he was originally asked by the secretary to talk about what benefit devolution had brought to Wales. As a person who had voted against devolution in the first place, who did not want to see the establishment of an Assembly; particularly down in Cardiff; who thought that we would lose out in North Wales to the South; who thought that it would cost an awful lot more money than the previous system of government in Wales, Darren had replied that perhaps he was not the best person to ask what the benefits had been. That said, he feels that there are some opportunities that devolution brings, the fact is that the Assembly is here to stay. We have to work hard to make it work in our interests and it has not done so, so far.
· 144 schools have closed since 1999.
· More patients waiting for NHS treatment than in 1999
· One third of Welsh Post Offices have closed since 1999
· Drug offences have increased by 590% since 1999
· Almost half of ASBOs issued by Welsh courts since 2000, when they were introduced, have been broken.
He ended his address on what he called that happy note and asked for any questions that persons wanted to ask.
A resident asked what is happening about Colwyn Bay waterfront.
Darren referred to recent history with the owner going into administration
He referred to a conversation he has had with the Acting Chief Executive Bethan Jones of Conwy County Borough Council. They had spoken of the Waterfront Strategy and all its implications. He said that it will take an awful lot of money to implement it.
Part of the Strategy includes absolutely necessary flood defences which must go ahead whether the bid for the whole strategy is successful or not. He does not feel optimistic that they will achieve the finances that they need to be able to do that. The scale of the problem is that on the flood defence side, the current Assembly budget for capital improvements to flood defences is about £22million a year.
Just in Clwyd West, the Waterfront scheme requires 11and a half million pounds and a scheme to improve the River Clwyd west tidal bank to protect Towyn and Kinmel Bay areas requires 12 and a half million pounds, to be completed. So those two projects exceed the Welsh budget immediately without considering anywhere else in Wales needing protection.
He feels that the pier is a disgrace and he feels embarrassed by it for the locality. Eirias Park is devoid of many of its facilities and attractions that it used to have. Our tourism industry is spiralling downwards as a result.
He is hopeful that the pier will now revert to either the Local Authority or better still a local trust which could work in conjunction with local groups to improve the pier. Apparently the base of the pier is a listed structure. So could presumably be rebuilt.
He continued to say If Colwyn Bay had some decent attractions it would do the local economy, jobs and civic pride a power of good.
He added that there are some incredibly positive things happening in Colwyn and one only has to look at Wynn Gardens, the way that things have turned around there thanks to Cliff Prout and others in the Old Colwyn Environment Federation.
He also referred to the wonderful improvements St John’s Garden but said there is so much more that can be done with a bit of joined up thinking, particularly around the positive impact that tourism can bring. He touched on the issue of marine leisure which has huge opportunities in Colwyn Bay with increasing numbers coming to use jet skis and boats.
This comment caused a debate about whether the promenade was for walkers / cyclists or for marine leisure and whether indeed the people who come to Colwyn to partake of marine leisure actually spend in the local economy.
There was evidence that they did do so, the promenade is wide enough to accommodate all, and obviously the more amenities that are put there for them and others, the more opportunities for them to spend in the local economy. A lot of present amenities are temporary pending the implementation of the Waterfront Strategy which has an intention to improve links with the Town centre we were told.
The secretary said, “ I notice in the paper this morning that the Welsh Assembly has spent £14million on furniture since it opened, a huge amount was spent on the Assembly building, we have free prescriptions in Wales but simple rules which would protect the environment over the storage of waste oil are not enacted and the Welsh Assembly has no idea when they may be enacted. My feeling is isn’t the important issue Government in Wales?
The Assembly are now seeking new powers to enact laws with respect to other matters (competency orders) My feeling is pass the laws that you have the powers to pass now or attach Wales to the laws passed in England .
You have commented on one tonight, most of the incentives for people with relation to housing do not relate to Wales because it has been passed to the Welsh Assembly but the Assembly have not got the money, so was it the right thing to do to have an Assembly, if they have not got the funding stream?
We have a postcode lottery and we have party politics, one party wants Wales to be on its own away from England; what does Wales have to support itself without England? We have a Government in Westminster, why do we need more government if the one in Cardiff can’t handle the pressure?
Darren replied that he had originally been against the expense of the Assembly; he thought that it would be South Wales dominated, prophesies which have been fulfilled. He is all for true devolution but the problem with the current devolution is that powers have been devolved to Cardiff by Westminster but also powers have been taken up from Local Authorities by Cardiff to the assembly from places like Conwy.
Darren said that he is in favour of true devolution which actually means more power to local authorities, therefore more local decision making, according to local priorities and local need. There is power for the Assembly to devolve all of its powers to local authority level if it wanted to; but it does not. Politicians have sticky hands in local and National politics, wanting to retain as much power as they can.
Darren said that he could not defend the Assembly spending on furniture, the Conservatives have criticised the expenditure of the Assembly Government, the reason that it was reported in the press.
He does not know why Ministers in Cardiff do not adopt perfectly sensible laws from London and there are some good pieces of legislation, one of them was in terms of the storage of waste oil mentioned. For one reason or another, the Assembly Minister has chosen not to enact that piece of law for Wales. She could do, all she has to do is issue a statement on the matter and introduce it. She has decided not to, in her wisdom. Darren explained that he thinks one of the reasons for the decision is that at the moment the Assembly has made a case to seek further devolved powers via the Government of Wales Act, in the area of environmental protection and waste management.
The case was supported by all political parties to increase Assembly powers in this area to deal with defining phrases and words in legislation in relation to Wales. The process should have taken six months but eighteen months later because politicians in Westminster and Whitehall have sticky hands, they are not prepared to give up the powers. There is stalemate.
There are areas Darren said where more powers would be useful and others where it would not be so good and he made the example of policing which he does not believe there is an argument for the Assembly to be responsible because of the east / west movement of criminality in North Wales, devolution of powers over policing might therefore not be as appropriate as for South Wales.
Devolution is good he concluded as long as powers are devolved to Local Authority level. That also goes for the Local Authority who should devolve powers down to Town Council level to get a better service for our communities.
The secretary asked Darren if the Conservative Party would bring these changes in when it comes into power in the Assembly; devolving powers to local authorities.
Darren replied that he looked forward to that time; his party would do things very differently, under the old system he explained, Local Authorities had greater powers than they do at the moment. There used to be more local government. What seems likely under the current coalition government in their present direction is that there will be much bigger local authorities in the not too distant future. Probably, there will be eight in Wales instead of twenty two. The problem of large County councils is that they tend to focus on one major city or town to the detriment of everywhere else. Llandudno for instance in this area tends to have more political influence and has fared better as a result.
The secretary asked So the Welsh Assembly is not doing a very good job?
Darren replied that he would say that the Assembly Government is not doing a very good job, not the whole Assembly.
There was a further debate on the subject of the tourism and marine leisure element of the local economy. Also one resident put the case that it used to be a quiet bay and now he felt that it was disrupted by all the activities on the prom.
Darren summed up the his views of issue, in the past, people would come for the day; spend money in the local shops which was good for local business. In the same way people who have perhaps a big boat could stay in a local hotel, dine out and spend money in the local restaurants and it pours money back into the economy, providing jobs, more business rates which can be spent on the local infrastructure. Higher quality tourism brings more money into the area. Where crowds gather, they tend to spend money which is to the benefit of the economy. Hopefully that will centre on a decent Waterfront with millions of pounds worth of investment. There will still be a place for walkers and ramblers and cyclists. There is also a diversity of different experience in towns like Llandudno and Rhyl for those that want diversity.
Councillor Cossey said that there is a local developer who wants to put the chalets back on the prom now that the jet skis have moved to Eirias park area. There may also be family members who visit the town whilst others are on the water. The Waterfront Strategy intends to open up the entrance by the pier to make it more inviting for people to visit the town.
The Town Council have been looking at restarting the Welsh Fargo train to link the areas to coincide with the strategy. It would be the only vehicle allowed under the railway bridge into the town.
Councillor Cheryl Carlisle thanked Darren for his support over the issue of residents’ objections to the proposal to place masts in Old Colwyn. There have been a number of residents who have written and the general consensus is that people do not want the masts.
Darren referred to a recent similar case in Rhos on sea and the developer had been convinced of the case of sharing a mast being operated by another operator which is far more sensible. They are also looking at one at the Welsh Mountain Zoo. They will make a decision and eventually make a planning application.
A resident asked how Darren could justify voting for an 8% increase in AMs’ remuneration when people are suffering fuel and other domestic costs and public sector pay was pegged at 2%; also bearing in mind that Darren had listed a number of things which had not gone right under the Assembly since 1999.
Darren explained that AMs do not have a vote about pay in the Assembly. Their pay is determined by an independent panel and the AMs have no say. The rate of pay is less than a headmaster of a school, less that the PR director of most PLCs; half of the pay of for instance the Chief Executive of Conwy County Council. Welsh AMs are paid less than any other British Assembly. He related to his long hours and long regular travel to Cardiff, which he expected when he decided to apply for residents’ votes at the ballot box. He finished by saying that politicians and democracy cost money. He feels that his constituents get a fair deal.
Cllr Bob Squire associated himself with the remarks of Cllr Cheryl Carlisle over the mast issue and wished to publicly acknowledge the help that Darren had given him particularly in arranging the hour and a quarter long meeting with the Housing Minister, when they had been able to put their points over well.
He continued to say that Darren has been vice chair on the Transient Population Group and the group has made a lot of progress, the Welsh Assembly is well aware of the situation and North Wales could well as a result end up with £4million in revenue support grant. He said he was grateful that Darren is a politician who takes on board concerns.
He continued to say that systems are not in place to measure what is coming in to North Wales and Conwy/ Denbighshire in particular. With relation to the problems of drug addiction, if you are here you get the treatment that leads to an increase in dependency units such as the Queens and Norfolk House. They are reliant on outsiders coming in and they will treat them if they are here. There should be a lot more done to stop them coming in. Rhyl and Colwyn Bay are suffering terribly and he asked Darren to reinforce that message at the Assembly.
Darren responded that there were two issues; the housing issue which if it was tackled would make it not so popular a place to come. Part of that problem has been created by the Assembly government, with the introduction of the Priority Needs Order and also by some unscrupulous landlords. He said that he feels that we have turned a corner and are seeing flats reconverted into family homes. The second issue; Better enforcement, he was pleased to see the local PCSO present. When he was a member of the Police Authority it upset him when there was little attention paid to drug enforcement in North Wales but a lot of attention paid to other things like speeding for example. Drugs and violent crime is a priority, with both of those issues, the police have difficulty with attacking. Intelligence is linked with officers on the beat and officers are behind computers doing administration. Everyone knows that the Chief Constable’s priorities lie elsewhere, reducing community beat managers, reduces the presence of policing on our streets in order to pay for police horses.
Darren said that he had seen the survey of police officers in North Wales as to whether they agreed with various statements. It is abundantly clear that most police officers feel very demoralised with the current system and they way that their performance is managed and with constant targets and the administration burden placed on them.
He continued Officers like getting out on the beat, detecting crimes and bringing offenders to justice, unfortunately the criminal justice system is not working like that these days. The pressure is on officers to give tickets rather than follow up a case. I am concerned about police morale and will be taking it up at my next quarterly meeting with him.
There was support expressed for Darren’s concern for issues with the Health Service. There was also concern expressed about MRSA in the larger hospitals.
Darren explained that the case for larger hospitals is that they cost less with economies of scale and they say it is easier to specialise in bigger hospitals (such as Walton). If the hospital is serving a large population the number of cases requires surgeons etc skilled to deal with numbers of the same sort of case rather than single cases in smaller hospitals.
Infection control to stamp out infection is a nightmare in a larger hospital. An infection will perpetuate and move around the hospital.
The standard of cleaning and the over prescription of antibiotics are causes.
Smaller hospitals have less of a problem with infections. Smaller is better and that was an argument which had a good outcome in the hospital closure program in Wales.
All the hospitals in Wales were given a reprieve by the Assembly Government following the elections except one, Abergele hospital; it is still up for closure.
The post office closure program is also interesting in Clwyd West there are 10 post offices up for closure. In the marginal Labour constituency next door, there is one and it is a similar type of area.
Unfortunately, political expediency does enter into these types of areas of decision making, a point made in the meeting by the secretary in a question. Politically expedient decisions are made, rather than the right decisions.
A resident commented that as a worker for the Cats Protection League, she could testify
about the issue of unscrupulous landlords. She had to do home visits in Colwyn Bay.
She had seen people come from prison in Scotland, come to Colwyn, re-
Darren replied The Welsh Assembly is introducing the Welsh Quality Housing Standard and says this is to improve the quality of housing in Wales. This is part of the reason that the housing stock in Conwy is being transferred to a Community Housing Trust called Cartrefle Conwy. The Council cannot afford to improve the housing. The move is forcing social housing landlords, such as the Council and Housing associations to bring their properties up to the Welsh housing quality standard.
On the one hand it did that and on the other, when Conwy CBC introduced a policy forcing landlords to improve the quality of accommodation for example HMOs a separate bathroom for each flat rather than shared bathrooms. The Assembly Government forced the Council to reverse its policy and drive down the standards of accommodation in the private sector. The Housing Minister has given a poor response on that issue. There is a crisis and the authorities should be involved and legislates to make rented accommodation to meet certain quality standards.
Down the coast, there are an increasing number of people living in holiday caravans on holiday parks, all year round. Some sell their homes and buying a caravan, living in it for 10 months of the year and going to Tenerife for eight weeks, then returning to their caravan. This is wrong; we may end up with trailer park ghettos on our doorstep. The Housing Minister has been asked to tackle this issue.
A resident asked for clarification about what was wrong about people living in caravans; she thought it was a case of personal choice.
It was discussed between councillors and Darren and summed up as follows; it is poor quality housing, if a large number of persons live like that, it is bad for the tourist industry, someone on holiday spends a lot of money locally. A resident “caravan dweller” is not likely to. Such persons also do not pay Council Tax because they are not supposed to live there all year but they use the system and everyone else pays for them to do so. They do not go on to the electoral roll so the County Council won’t get the subsidy for them.
The scale of the problem in Conwy is shown as follows; over 300 bus passes were issued to people who were normally resident on caravan parks, they are funded by our Council Tax money that they do not pay.
Looking at General Practitioner lists of people registered with GPs as though they live in Conwy, compared to the actual population according to the official Assembly Government statistics. There are 4000 more people registered with GPs in Conwy than actually live in the County. They are our hidden population. We need the funding from the Assembly Government to pay for their services, health, education, social service and so on. The most intensive users of social services in Conwy live on caravan parks. This would relieve the burden on the council tax payer. There are twelve thousand holiday caravans in the County of the type spoken about.
There is duplicity between the Assembly Government allowing this kind of living in poor quality housing to develop and forcing social landlords to improve the quality of accommodation. There should be good standard of housing for all.
Darren said that he was not referring to Park Homes which are quality mobile homes and are designed to fit the bill. He is also in favour of an Assembly scheme to be enabled at some time to allow the elderly to unlock the equity in their homes.
A resident spoke of the need for a hospital such as the North Wales Hospital, Denbigh. It was closed because of a perceived stigma.
Darren pointed out that the site is being considered as a prison in the future.
The Chair closed the discussion and thanked Darren for attending and giving such an interesting talk and answering the questions in such an interesting manner.
There was a round of applause for Darren Millar, Assembly Member for Clwyd West and Assembly Shadow Minister for the Environment and Planning.
Darren extended a welcome to residents and the committee to visit the Assembly and meet him there at some point.
