NATIONAL ENERGY COMPANY TO TACKLE FUEL POVERTY

Plaid Cymru has called for a national energy company for Wales to be established to reduce energy prices and tackle climate change.

Ynni Cymru (Energy Wales) - a not-for-profit organisation similar to Welsh Water - would be responsible for tackling fuel poverty through investing in infrastructure, green energy production, and research and development.

Simon Thomas, Plaid Cymru's spokesperson on Energy, Climate Change, and Rural Affairs, commissioned the report on Ynni Cymru. He said, "In Wales, we generate more electricity than we consume and yet we have some of the highest electricity costs in Europe. Ownership, control and investment in renewable and sustainable energy is a key question in this election and central to our future prosperity."

The Plaid Cymru report highlights the severity of Wales' fuel poverty, as nearly a quarter of Welsh households spend more than ten per cent of their household incomes on energy bills, compared to only 11.6% of households in England.

Simon Thomas said:

"Wales needs a national energy company to focus on reducing energy prices for consumers through renewable sources. Even though we have a thousand miles of coastline and five million acres of land, we produce less renewable energy than elsewhere in the UK.

"Despite being a net exporter of electricity, Welsh consumers are faced with higher bills than any other country in the UK. The answer is not to place an arbitrary cap on bills but to take profiteering shareholders out of the equation and take ownership of our own energy.

"Plaid Cymru wants Wales to be fully self-sufficient in renewable electricity by 2035 and creating a national energy company for Wales is part of achieving that aim

"If we are serious about cutting Wales' emissions by 80% by 2050, we need to act now. Plaid Cymru is committed to defending Wales' natural environment and reducing high-energy costs for consumers.

"As we leave the EU, a new internal energy market will develop in the UK, and it's important we accelerate towards self-sufficiency through cleaner, greener energy production

"The Tories have dragged their feet on projects like the Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon that would create high quality jobs and green energy, and once again they have left it out of their manifesto.

"The two Westminster parties continue to bicker about capping energy prices but the sensible solution is to take profiteering out of the equation, replicating successful models like EDF which is owned by the French public.

"The only way to defend Wales' natural environment and reduce energy prices is to send a strong group of Plaid Cymru MPs to Westminster to form a united Welsh block in the House of Commons."

ENDS

PUBLICLY OWNED BANK NEEDED TO REPLACE BRANCH CLOSURES

Plaid Cymru wants a “people’s bank” that does not abandon its customers

Plaid Cymru will push for the creation of a publicly-owned bank if elected in June, following a series of branch closures across Wales.

The party says that too many private banks are closing branches and neglecting customers and says it wants a “people’s bank” that “does not abandon its customers”. 

HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland, Barclays and Lloyds Banking Group are all among banks that cut 600 branches between April 2015 to April 2016. 90 per cent of those closures were in areas where the median household income is below the average of £27,600, according to the Office of National Statistics. By comparison, five out of the eight branches opened by these banks over the same period were in some to the wealthiest neighbourhood in Britain - Chelsea, Canary Wharf, St Paul’s, Marylebone and Clapham - all in London.

Communities across Wales have either already lost their last bank or are soon to lose them, with implications for residents and businesses who will be forced to travel to access their cash, which in rural Wales can mean upwards of a 90 minute round trip.

Simon Thomas, the party’s spokesperson on Rural Affairs, has called for a publicly-owned bank to be created in Wales, similar to those seen in other European countries, and pledged that Plaid Cymru MPs would pressure the UK Government to take action.

He accused the Labour Party of failing to stand up to the Tories and for turning a blind eye to branch closures across Wales.

Simon Thomas AM said:

“It is vitally important that individuals and businesses in all communities have easy access to financial advice and banking services. Unfortunately we’re seeing the same centralisation process with the private banking sector as has been happening in the public sector.

“I am fed up of hearing that customers can choose online banking as this fails to take into account the poor broadband service experienced in many parts of Wales.

“It’s not just Plaid Cymru campaigning against this - the Federation of Small Businesses and the Farmers’ Union of Wales have raised concerns about this culture of centralisation. There will be towns across Wales with no branches at all with some forced to make 90 minute round trips to get access to money.

“Banks are abandoning their customers in pursuit of more and more profit and there should be a duty put on these banks, who provide an essential service, to put the customers’ needs before their own pockets, in the same way as postal services.

“The Tories are intent on putting profits before people and the Labour Party has turned a blind eye to the continuing programme of closures across our country. Plaid Cymru MPs will not just sit on their hands. Our MPs will stand up in Parliament and demand that changes be brought in. We would push for the creation of a people’s bank, owned by the public. It would co-operate, not compete with other financial providers, including the much needed Welsh Development Bank.”

ENDS

Notes to editors:

Branch closure figures covered by Reuters here: http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-banks-branches-idUKKCN0Z60BP

WALES “SHACKLED” BY WESTMINSTER

Plaid demands freedom to grow Welsh economy

Plaid Cymru has demanded that Wales be “released from its Westminster shackles” so that its economy can grow.

The party’s treasury spokesperson, Jonathan Edwards, has said that Westminster’s legacy is making Wales one of the poorest regions in Europe whilst inner London has become the richest, and pledged to “fight tooth and nail” if re-elected in June, for Wales to be “released from its Westminster shackles” and allowed to re-build its economy.

Mr Edwards said that people in Wales suffer with lower wages and a more challenging standard of living than their English and Scottish neighbours as a result of being unable to grow its own economy. He said that Wales has been “shackled” by Westminster, reliant on Tory politicians representing constituencies outside Wales to make decisions for Wales.

The Carmarthen East and Dinefwr MP, who is standing for re-election in June, said that Wales must be given the freedom to “fix its own problems”.

Commenting, Plaid Cymru MP for Carmarthen East & Dinefwr, Jonathan Edwards, said:

“Westminster’s legacy is making Wales one of the poorest of all the nations and regions in Europe whilst inner London has become the richest.

“For how long will we put up with having to ask Westminster to build roads and railways in Wales as well as England? For how long will we put up with having to ask Westminster to support Wales’s exporters and manufacturers, as well as London’s banking sector? The reality is, no Westminster MP representing constituencies outside Wales will ever have the unique needs of Wales as their priority.

“People across Wales are suffering with lower wages and a poorer standard of living than elsewhere across the British State. And is it any wonder, when we see billions of taxpayers’ money being spent on projects such as HS2 and Crossrail, when the people of Wales can’t even travel from the north to the south of our own country on a train without leaving it?

“If we want our economy to grow, our wages to increase and our standard of living to be improved, we have to do it ourselves.

“We must demand that Wales be released from its Westminster shackles so that we can fix the problems that have been left unattended by Westminster and start building our country into the country it could and should be.

“We don’t have to put up with low wages. We can demand that we be given the responsibility to grow our own economy, bypassing the bureaucracy of Westminster. If Westminster won’t electrify our railways then we will, and if Westminster wants to spend all taxpayers’ money in one corner of England then they can allow us to make our own investments in Wales.

“It’s time Wales took control of its own future and stopped relying on a bureaucratic Westminster establishment who will never have Wales’ interests at heart.”

ENDS

GREEN BELT? FOR WALES??

There is a clear need for a Welsh Green belt across all of our country, to fringe our urban areas, to help focus out of town and fringe of town developments, not to mention helping to protect green spaces between and within some of our urban areas. It's worth noting that 'Green belt', if respected is a useful planning tool, originally introduced for London in 1938, it was then rolled out to England as a whole by a government circular in 1955 but interestingly enough not to Wales.

The original concept was to allow local councils to designate green belts when they wanted to restrict or control urban growth.  The idea worked and worked well, as by 2007, Green belt covered something like 13% of England (about one-and-a-half million hectares) despite the best efforts of previous Conservative, New Labour and Conservative–Liberal Democrat Governments it is still remains relatively well protected by normal planning controls against "inappropriate development".

Here in Wales we have one patch of notional green belt (or Green wedge) and that lies between Cardiff and Newport. Scotland has seven and Northern Ireland has 30 - each has its own policy guidance.  The preservation of green spaces aside, it comes down to planning permission, which can be a touchy subject, especially when a development (whether for commercial, housing or energy development) is controversial or the final decision is made against the wishes of local people.

It should be pretty clear to most dispassionate observers that in Wales, we lack a coherent national strategic development plan for Wales judging by the half-baked way local unitary development plans have been put together over the years. A number of which are focussed on housing developments, which have done (and will do) some pretty serious damage to our environment in the process without any necessary improvements in infrastructure e.g new railway stations with reasonably priced (or even free), adequate and secure park and ride facilities at Caerleon (closed as a result of the Beeching cuts in 1962, in the UDP since 1984) Llanwern and Magor.

In the south east, along the coastal belt and in and around Newport and Torfaen (not to mention Cardiff and Caerphilly) the last thirty years has seen a significant if not spectacular growth in the amount of housing, a significant percentage of which has never aimed to fulfil local housing needs. As a result the infrastructure along the coastal belt between Chepstow, Caldicot, Rogiet and Magor is struggling to cope with existing developments and this is well before the projected expansion of housing on and around the former Llanwern site really kicks in.

Northern Newport has now been linked to the south Cwmbran - something that has brought little material benefit to the residents of either urban area but has contributed much to traffic congestion. Similarly linking Cwmbran with Sebastopol will bring scant benefit to local residents. Even if eventually housing is built on the land just exactly how much of it will be affordable to local residents?

When the Severn Bridge tolls are reduced (rather than removed) after 2018, there will be a significant bump in house prices as people living in and around Bristol move cash in on cheaper housing over here.  This will impact on both affordable and available housing, developers will no doubt pitch their developments accordingly to cash in on perceived higher wages in the Bristol area and perceived cheaper housing over here (and no doubt our local authorities will fall over themselves to accommodate the developers wishes regardless how local people feel).

The National Assembly should know better and act accordingly, the institution when established was supposed to have sustainability enshrined in its actions, but, at times you really have to wonder, especially when it comes to the impact of some of the proposed developments on our communities. We need to protect the green wedges around and within our urban communities – because once developed they are gone for good.

The problem caused by a lack of protection to our Green wedges, etc is aggravated by the fact that what one generation of elected officials (and council officers) envisages as a green wedge, green lane, etc is often seen by later generations of elected officials (and council officers) as either prime land for development or a nice little earner to help balance out the books - this means that there is a real lack of stability and a long term vision for many of our urban areas and impacts on our quality of life. 

The National Assembly needs to act like the Welsh Parliament it should be and take the long view and create Welsh Green belt land with full legal and planning protections. This might go some way to calming things down when it comes to development planning and might introduce a more long-term sustainable democratic element into the process. This is something that could be accomplished by creating Welsh Green belt land, as part of the process we also need an urgent and open debate into the planning process in Wales - something that has been long overdue.

Successive Westminster government’s (in England) over the next few years will continue to talk about getting planning officers "off people's backs" with a relaxation of current rules. When they talk about ‘people’ they mean developers. In true Spiv fashion ‘for a limited period, people are able able to build larger extensions on houses (up to eight metres for detached homes and six for others). Shops and offices will also be able grow to the edges of their premises as Plan A (harsh Public Sector Cuts) continues to unravel and on the back of BREXIT a note of desperation may begin to creep into Westminster’s attempts to boost stabilise the economy.

These sounds good; it seems very reasonable save for the fact that somewhere amongst the smoke and mirrors the plan will reduce developer’s obligations to build proportional amounts of affordable housing and avoiding flood risk will go out the window. Not that long ago the previous Westminster government rewrote the entire planning framework (for England) despite some fierce resistance from countryside campaigners. No doubt Westminster ministers will want further changes to planning rules (in England) in an attempt to boost house building and revive the economy.

Not wanting to be left out (and bereft of any fresh ideas), a few years ago the previous Labour in Wales Government in Cardiff also pursued major changes to planning rules in Wales aiming to ‘tilt the balance in favour of economic growth over the environment and social factors’. This decision was in my opinion aimed quite specifically at overturning those few occasions when our Local Authorities have rejected developments (often at the behest of local residents) rather than putting economic needs ahead of economic and environmental benefits and will do little for sustainable, flood free development to deal with local housing needs let alone preserve our green spaces.