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Another child maimed at ASDA Aberdare… how long before some one is killed there ?
The South Wales Fire Service reported : “Fire crews were called to Asda to extricate a three year old male child from an escalator rail. Firefighters used small cutting gear and the child was treated on the scene by paramedics for a wrist injury before being taken to hospital by ambulance. Firefighters from Merthyr and Aberdare Fire Stations attended this incident.”
This is the SECOND INCIDENT involving a CHILD at ASDA Aberdare in the last few months.
Both incidents involved the escalator installed to reach the new ‘mezzanine’ floor at ASDA Aberdare.
When ASDA originally built the Aberdare store (near Cwmbach) they built it so that internal floor expansion was possible. By expanding within the existing store space, they are not required to go through the local planning process which would entail listening to the views of local people and their democractically elected representatives.
Greedy corporations cut corners and if that involves exploiting a loophole in the UK planning system, they’ll do it.
Clearly, there are safety issues at ASDA Aberdare affecting any one who uses the store, especially children.
ASDA is now an American company… it was swallowed up by American corporate badboys Walmart many years ago.
Most of Walmart’s bullying managerial culture has spread to ASDA, including ASDA Aberdare.
Overnight staff lock-ins are common
If you use ASDA Walmart as a customer please be very careful particularly if you take your children shopping. If you are a worker at this supermarket, please ensure you too look after yourself … don’t leave your workplace in an ambulance. Join your GMB ASDA union today -
Who is the Lady feeding the birds at Aberdare Park boating lake ?
The friendly sing-song voice of Roy Noble may become a feature of Aberdare town if campaigners are given permission to erect an innovative multimedia statue in Market Street.
Local campaign group Up Aberdare! are co-ordinating the efforts to bring a new landmark to Aberdare town centre marking the contribution Roy Noble has made to Aberdare and to comedy. Locals have already dubbed the statue project ‘Roy Noble’s Erection’.
At a recent public meeting a draft design for the statue was unveiled and a spokesperson for Up Aberdare! claimed “this is the most advanced multimedia statue of its kind in the world. It comes with a full-spectrum infrared remote control system. The head on the statue can be programmed to express over two different facial gestures… sadness and happiness.”
“Roy Noble the Statue – has a poly-sensory feedback system. It can pick up verbal feedback from passers-by as well as visual feedback. And if you kick or touch the statue, it can also react. Roy the Statue is not going to be stiff… he’s fun.”
“Roy Noble the Statue will be manufactured within an ISO9000 factory… in Turkmenistan. He will be fully bi-lingual capable of broadcasting in English and Welsh. The Welsh Language Board have been very supportive and their colleagues in the Welsh Language Society have given their ‘blessing’.”
“We aim to embed a camera in every crack and crevice of Roy Noble the Statue… from his toes to his toupe. We can then cast a flow of images to a variety of audiences… broadcast on mainstream television like the BBC or narrowcast on the Web to a select audience.”
“Our sound engineers have succeeded in perfectly replicating the chirpy chappy sound of Roy Noble… the one we’re all very familiar with. He – or rather IT – can speak, tell jokes, sing songs, read poetry, give a weather forecast, make a traffic announcement, even give a firm verbal warning to any drunken revellers in Market Street that might try to relieve themselves on him.”
“Don’t be fooled by that cheeky charm of Roy Noble… behind that genial fascade lies the mind of Wales’ greatest comic genius. Roy Noble the Statue will try – we can but try! – to reach the same lofty heights of humour. Research scientists at Cardiff University’s Sociology Department have produced a Welsh comedy algorithm after decades of research into this esoteric subject. This new algorithm will be at the heart of the art we hope Roy Noble the Statue will manufacture in Market Street, Aberdare. ”
“We believe in ‘comedy for the masses’ and who better than Roy Noble to bring mirth directly into the Valleys town of Aberdare,” said Up Aberdare! “There is no manufacturing industry left worthy of the name in Cynon Valley. It’s all been outsourced. We’ve been downsized. We can but craft a bit of comedy to cheer ourselves”.
Rhondda Cynon Taff Council Leader Rusty Roberts said : “It looks good, bach. Think of all those stinking rich Jap tourists we could bring to Aberdare. They do love those techno gizmo thingies, yes. And of course we could use it to sell the Council and the Party… err… you didn’t record that bit did you, bach ? I mean we could use it to market Rhondda Cynon Taff to potential investors.”
Up Aberdare! ended the public meeting by praising Roy Noble’s contribution to comedy and his sheer versatility as a performer.
‘Arriva‘ in Aberdare and what do you see …
… a large filthy street sign greets visitor who arrive (and depart) by bus or train.
The large sign points to Aberdare’s train station run by Arriva trains.
The sign is supposed to be both readable and bilingual but it’s hardly possible to read the word ‘gorsaf’ (station).
The smaller sign that says “Clean it Up” offers good advice.
Why not ask Arriva – your local train company – to help ? You can email Arriva Trains Wales at customer.services@arrivatrainswales.co.uk or telephone them on 08456 061 660.
Ask them to Clean it Up
They are 95 years old and they’re having a special makeover in Aberdare Park.
The little cherubs that grace Aberdare Park’s historic fountain are currently being renovated and given a new lick of paint along with the whole fountain structure.
The grand fountain was donated to the people of Aberdare in 1911 by Lord Merthyr to commemorate the coronation of King George V
See the Full Set of Photos in the Gallery …
Ann Clwyd takes her place in the polling station queue. Photo by Simon Collis of the British Consulate in Iraq.
Is this the most erudite shop assistant in Wales ?
Photograph : Former professor of archaeology, Mr Eric ‘the Relic’ Talbot, helping out at Pete’s Organics in Pontypridd recently.
Aberdare Cancer Research UK shop
The Cancer Research charity shop in Commercial Street, Aberdare is seeking volunteers, especially some one who can help run the shop on Saturdays. For further details, please come into the shop to speak to the manager, alternatively ring Aberdare 01685 881169
Who are these two gentlemen from Abercynon ?
Photograph : On the right is Councillor Albert ‘Alby’ Davies MBE (Labour, Abercynon) and his good friend Mike Williams (Secretary of Abercynon RFC) as seen in Commercial Street Aberdare.
Doing the ‘can can’ at the Pickled Pepper…
And speculation continues that the Valleys town of Mountain Ash is to be sold in an online eBay-like auction. This is the first Welsh town to be publically auctioned under a new Welsh Assembly Government initiative called the Communities Regeneration and Partnership (CRAP) strategy.
We asked Christine Chapman (Cynon Valley AM) if she thought that Mountain Ash benefitted from CRAP funding from the Welsh Assembly, but Mrs Chapman declined to comment.
There’s a smart new kid on the Commercial Street block in Aberdare …
Tuckers pizza parlour, Tel 01685 870 888
As the Stereophonics haven’t released a decent album since Word Gets Around, perhaps it’s time to hunt for other local alternatives….
Local indie-rock band Souldriver are at Hirwaun Con Club on Saturday November 4th 2006. Start 7pm. For tracks, pics and other things zoom to their website at http://www.souldriver.co.uk/
On the fortieth anniversary of the disaster, we look back through the eyes of the Pembrokeshire poet Bob Reeves. He visited Aberdare to promote his collection of poetry ‘My Blood My Earth’ which was written many years after the Aberfan disaster which so influenced his life and creative work.
A former policeman, Bob Reeves was sent immediately to Aberfan when news of the disaster reached Pembrokeshire. He writes :
“I heard the news with a sense of unreality. It was another place, another planet. I didn’t want to believe. I didn’t want to listen. But then acceptance came swiftly, like a kick in the belly. I picked up my children and held them fiercely. My daughter’s tiny fingers traced the wetness on my cheeks as I wept for the fathers and mothers of Aberfan, as I weep for them now. Now that my children are grown and theirs are not.
I left Pembrokeshire with the Police Mobile Column in the pre-dawn darkness of the next morning. We travelled in silence. Each man locked in a cell of his own fear. Afraid of what we could find, and I suspect, even more afraid of our own reactions.
I remember the great austere beauty of the valley carrying the road from Brecon to Merthyr and the clutter of small houses that was Cefn Coed. The Merthyr Valley was something of a shock. Not Merthyr Tydfil itself, for I found the jumble of pubs and chapels and shops and even the twisted dereliction of dead industry, oddly attractive. It was the earth that shook me. It was black. A dull, dusty black. Lifeless with no bloom. It was like a woman old before her time, dragged down by too many births and too much pain. It was tired and it showed.
…
I will not catalogue the events for they have been well recorded. Rather I chose to remember the people. The women with bells in their Welsh voices, but who stood silent then, watching. The old man with the collier’s scars, who spat black and cried with me, and neitheir of us was ashamed. “Bach,” he said, a foot below my head. “Bach, I’ve done it all. Why couldn’t it be me?”
And the men who dug into that mud like demons. Heroes. who even though they knew it was over, expressed their grief and love in the only way they knew, by refusing to stop, camouflaging their tears with sweat and trying to numb their minds with exhaustion. They were all and are all, a lovely, virile, vital people, and for those few days I was of them and bled for them inside.
I saw small coffins and later I was stationed at the cemetery gate and saw the cross of flowers on the hill. And I stood and wonderered how many kisses on small, soft cheeks that last morning? How many faces flannelled and heads brushed under protest? How many sharp words regretted and now beyond recall? It is possible to count and compile statistics but how does one measure grief? And how many tears make a river?
These valleys have been exploited for generations by men, human moles who burrowed and tore into the very belly of the earth. Men who in their turn were exploited by others. Some paid with their lives and this was always accepted as the way of things. But these were children, still in the Spring of their being. Innocents who had grown and blossommed like flowers to brighten the black and tired earth with their coming. And now they were gone.
I am left with one ancient Welsh word – GALANAS – the blood price. Was there ever such a price as this?”
Let’s jump into our time machine and go back nearly thirty years to a Saturday night outside the Boot in Aberdare. How did people behave then ? What type of behaviour was acceptable ?
It’s the end of the night… closing time… stop tap. People leave the pub and a row ensues.
A young man loses his temper. He commits a grave social faux pas… he swears.
The local newspaper reported it back in August 1977 :
“For using indecent language outside the Boot Hotel, Victoria Square, Adrian Chapman, aged 21 of Park View Terrace, Abercwmboi, was fined £5 by Aberdare Magistrates.
“Police Constable Stephen Isaac told the court that Chapman shouted “F… off!”
“When I cautioned him he replied, ‘Sorry, I lost my temper’,” the Constable replied.
Now in 2006, if the Police fined every reveller who swore like that how much money would they raise ? We think they’d probably raise enough to keep Aberdare Police Station open and staffed 24 hours a day. Now we swear (oops!) that’s a good idea…
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