It is exactly a year since we wrote about
the forgotten people of Hirwaun. In our report we tried to convey the basic facts which went unreported by Trinity Mirror, publishers of the Cynon Valley Leader.
The willingness of working people to respond to the challenge of overdevelopment in Hirwaun was a story we could not ignore.
Events have moved on swiftly since then : the English housing developer seeking to build several hundred homes in the last remaining green space in Hirwaun (the Gloucester site and nearabouts) had their planning application rejected by Rhondda Cynon Taff Council. They have since appealed against that decision, and this has led to the decision being reviewed by the Welsh Assembly.
There will therefore be a public inquiry at Hirwaun on Tuesday 23rd October 2007, held at Hirwaun Community Centre. Starting promptly at 10am. The Public Inquiry may run for two days.
Why should you bother to attend such a public meeting ? Karen Morgan of Action for Hirwaun puts it eloquently and passionately thus : “Please, please give some of your time to help save the Gloucesters by attending some or all of the inquiry and having your voices heard. If we all continue to stand together as a community, we have a good chance of winning and we’ll have some kind of legacy to leave behind for our children and grandchildren to enjoy.”
Glynhafod School lies at the foot of a mountain.
It was closed last year. The Local Authority, Rhondda Cynon Taff Council, claimed there were too many spare places.
They gave the usual marketing mumbo-jumbo excuses about “rationalising”.
It was reported in the Cynon Valley Leader that the property was sold in an auction in London.
The buyer was one Ian Roberts, a local man who is manager of Cwmaman Institute.
There is a brief ‘walk-around’ video clip on Glynhafod School on Youtube.
The development at Glynhafod is reminiscent of what happened to the site of the old Aberdare Boys’ School : an old school site was sold off in a questionable manner by Rhondda Cynon Taff Council only to be developed for hyper-profits by some local developer/entrepreneur.
It is the Grammar of Capital thing again.
The house-building economy has to expand. It is an imperative of the capitalist system. The conversion of schools into housing estates is perfectly normal in a system which must expand, exploit, and dominate.
Heed the whispered warnings of ghosts, listen to their advice and co-operate with them. They tell us about the past and foretell our future.
In the photograph there is a misty view across the Cynon Valley, from Cwmbach looking down the hill near St Margaret’s Church, towards Aberaman and Aberdare. The photographer has failed to capture a ghost, so instead offers to sketch some notes.
In Cwmbach the first Co-Operative Society in Wales was formed in 1860. On this little Welsh hill there was a magnificent Co-Operative store that lay at the heart of a vibrant Welsh community ‘growing-up’ in the era of industrialisation.
Borrow a Welsh Mam today
Read the rest of this page »
They don’t call her the “Cynon Valley Liar” for nothing…
Her Majesty the Queen formally opened
Parliament yesterday and gave the customary Queen’s Speech outlining the government’s proposed policies for the new session.
Aberdare once had its own Queen Liz… an excellent local journalist called Liz Makin. She wrote for the Aberdare Leader newspaper, as it was then called, for a number of years.
Here’s a typical Liz Makin piece from Aberdare Leader, page 1, 21/7/77 :
Title : Traders’ noses twitch over curry and chips
The possibility of curry and chips being on sale in the town centre has been given a hot reception by Aberdare traders and residents.
They fear late-night rowdyism and vandalism and say vermin will be attracted. The pungent smell of spicy curry will affect trade especially at the clothes’ shop nearby, they claim.
It’s such an evocative title line and the audacity of rhyming “twitch” with “chips”.
No photo accompanied this story, because none was needed.
Queen Liz’s quip about noses twitching had done the job for the Leader!
Imagine Cynon Valley as an orange being squeezed …
The latest pips to squeak are from Abernant
Residents in Abernant are infuriated by a proposal to build on the local village green.
People from across Cynon Valley can sympathise with their plight because building overdevelopment is a key feature of the Cynon Valley economy today. It is spurred on by a planning system which favours the developer-capitalists and the mammoth planning bureaucracy of the local County Borough Council who have a vested interest in continued overdevelopment.
Individuals and communities who dare to argue “no, enough is enough… where is this development leading?” are simply trodden on like unwelcome cockroaches in their own communities.
Yesteryear we might have argued the case ‘for’ or ‘against’ in the local newspaper, but in 2006, Aberdare has no free press where such a discussion could take place. Freedom of speech in Aberdare is a luxury for a political and commercial elite. It has been completely marginalised and shunted to the sidelines into online forums, websites, blogs and the occasional meeting in a local Chapel organised by annoyed citizens.
The media are, as Noam Chomsky argues, adjuncts of the powerful. The media exist to ensure we consent to what the elite have decided is in their best interest. To question economic overdevelopment, whether it is the overdevelopment of houses, roads, or any form of overdevelopment, would be to question the very basis on which the Cynon Valley economy rests : capitalism.
Corporate media do not reflect any anti-capitalist sentiment today because it is, again to quote Noam Chomsky, beyond the “bounds of the expressible“. The media only permit a spectacle or charade of free and open discussion. Thus we can read about opposition to wind turbines in the Cynon Valley in the local newspaper – wind turbines do not, after all, generate much advertising revenue – but we are unable to read about the mass opposition to overdevelopment or to the duelling of the Heads of the Valley road near Hirwaun, a Welsh Assembly Government project. That is beyond the bounds of the expressible. It might upset the capitalist apple-cart and people might get the wrong idea and start engaging in a real democratic debate.
In Abernant, if we look back thirty years, we might find lessons there. Thirty years ago, services at Aberdare were being downgraded and moved to Prince Charles hospital. Thousands took part in rallies and marches. Such expressions of solidarity are nowadays rare. We can but marvel at these mass movement in history books.
Today bourgeois capitalism reigns triumphant and the very last thing the rich and powerful and their newspapers would admit is that there are pips squeaking in every corner of the Cynon Valley. That might give working people a sense that they had something in common . The last thing the bourgeosie want is a conscious working class… it would be bad for business.
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…
In May 1977 hospital laundry workers marched in Aberdare protesting at the closure of Aberdare Hospital Laundry. They carried a banner (as photographed in the Aberdare Leader) proclaiming their protest in rhyming couplets :
“All you councillors that want our vote
read this plackard and please take note
Save our Laundry at Aberdare
to show the people that you care”
Perhaps the 1970s were the real Halcyon Years for Protest Poetry.
Nowadays protest marches in Aberdare are not so eloquent. Recently a “Freedom Rally” was held in Aberdare as reported by Gary Marsh the Editor of the Cynon Valley Leader.
In 1977 a protest was held by people who wanted to work. Thirty years later, a protest was held by people who wanted to consume and to act out their consumer fantasies at the expense of society. This difference seems to be lost on Mr Marsh who does not understand (or pretends not to understand) the difference between a real protest and a publicity stunt.
