Return to magazine articles index

The 2002 CPRW Youth Conference was held at Llangollen YHA between the 28th and 30th of October. This was to be my first CPRW youth conference, having just joined the organisation, and it was seen as a good introduction for me into CPRW activities and campaigns. I awaited it with some trepidation, unsure whether or not I would be engulfed by the excitement and noise that 34 teenagers can generate over 3 days. Would my ears be able to take it?

The delegates

On Monday afternoon, Deb Wozencraft, CPRW's Liaison Officer, Rhydian Scurlock-Jones, a CPRW volunteer, and I took on the task of shepherding all our delegates towards Llangollen YHA where the conference would take place. This was no easy task as severe weather had delayed trains and some students had ended up in the back of beyond. However, after some time trawling the train stations of north Wales we managed to get everyone where we wanted them in order to start the proceedings.

In all, 34 young people had come from 11 different schools from all across Wales. This in itself shows some schools' desire to educate their pupils in countryside and planning issues and is a testament to the hard work of CPRW in providing such an opportunity.

The conference was based on a number of real planning applications within the area and visits would be made to the proposal sites and, in most instances, talks would be given by the applicants and those who opposed the development. This would enable students to gain an holistic view of the planning process and allow them to determine the applications for themselves.

The programme started with an afternoon of introductions. John Osley, from the Countryside Council for Wales, gave a talk on their work in North East Wales and Deb and Helen Mrowiec, CPRW's Deputy Director gave introductions into CPRW's work, the planning system and other relevant organisations. Later on, the delegates were introduced to four planning applications and were asked to vote on whether they would grant the applications permission or not. In some cases the results were surprising but I was sure things would not be the same by the last day. In the evening, talks were given by Steve Burnett from HLC Environmental Projects Ltd. and David Darlington, Chairman of CPRW's local branch, about the proposed Wrexham Resource Recovery Centre. This resulted in some very tough questioning from our delegates and set the scene for some to practice their interrogation techniques.

On the Tuesday morning, after breakfast, we all boarded a coach and, after numerous head counts, set off to see the application sites for ourselves. En route we stopped off at Pen y Bont landfill site and were given a tour by Mathew Kirk from the Shanks Group. This visit gave the students an opportunity to view a landfill site and its activities. Despite the pouring rain, I think many of them were taken aback by the sheer scale and organisation involved, and must have benefited from the experience. We moved on to Acrefair where the students were given a tour of the site of a proposed housing development by Wrexham Branch member, Ruth Woodcock. Discussions took place about the unsuitability of this former waste site and we all left with different thoughts in our heads.

Site visit at Pandy

Next was a fly-by visit to the site of the proposed Resource Recovery Centre on Wrexham's industrial estate. This allowed our delegates to view the surrounding area and make observations about other users of the estate, adjacent farmland and road access issues. We then made our way towards the Ceiriog Valley, an area that I had not been to before. I was struck by its beauty. An application for a shed to be converted into a therapy room was situated at the end of a muddy track in Pandy. Fighting miserable weather conditions and potential trench foot, the delegates listened with interest to the applicants' case and departed with puzzled expressions after being informed that the local planners had, in fact, recommended that the application be rejected.

Finally the contentious issue of wind turbines was approached with a visit to the Golden Pheasant Hotel in Llwynmawr. It was here that the delegates listened for some time to the arguments of the Ceiriog Valley Action Group against a potential WindWorks scheme. The room was packed as quite a number of local residents had come to watch the show and to give a sense of community action. To balance things up, Mark Legerton of National Windpower came along and gave a talk on wind power, in general, and tried his best to answer a barrage of questions.

After a busy and tiring day, we returned to Llangollen where we ate before spending the evening researching and organising our arguments for a 'Planning Committee' meeting the next day. In addition, Lonely Mountain Activities had been providing team-building activities during the two evenings. If our plan was to tire our delegates out before bed, it didn't work. In the early hours of the morning, I was still lying in my bed wondering when the party would end and wishing I was in a tent!

On the Wednesday we welcomed Jenny Smith, CPRW's Assistant Director, who has the Herculean task of organising the CPRW Youth Conferences each year. We proceeded with our committee meeting, chaired by Jenny, and listened to spokespersons who outlined the 'fors' and 'againsts' of each application before the floor was opened to debate. Each debate was followed by another individual vote, the results of which, as suspected, had changed. The combination of the visits and listening to different arguments had obviously sparked them up. Were these youngsters our future planning officers or local councillors?

Presentation to the 'committee'

Jenny Smith adds: On behalf of CPRW, I would like to thank all those who took part in this, CPRW's 18th Youth Conference, and all those who helped and co-operated with its organisation. As always, I was extremely impressed with the standard of the debate in the 'Committee Meeting' I chaired and was heartened to hear from many of the students, and from some of their teachers, that taking part would help in their future studies or careers. Last, but not least, thanks must be expressed to the Countryside Council for Wales who sponsor the conference as part of their Partnership Plan with CPRW.

Return to top of page