“They're more interested in making the backs of the buildings look nice for the ferries”

The Daily Post backs Enterprise Zone status for Holyhead

I was in Holyhead on Monday with Wales Office Minister, David Jones MP, to meet with local small business and shop owners to discuss the economic problems facing the town. The general consensus was that despite the millions which have been ploughed into Holyhead over the years, due to a lack of consultation with local residents and businesses (“they just do what they want to do”), and due to a lack of vision and direction in both WAG and the County Council, the economic fortunes of the town have declined rather than improved. This is certainly borne out by the fact that Holyhead now has the highest jobseekers to vacancy ratio in all of Wales. There was also great dissatisfaction that more had not been done to help two of the town’s largest employers, Anglesey Aluminium and Eaton Electric, which both closed within months of each other in 2009 losing 700 jobs between them – the eleventh hour offer of a £48m loan to Anglesey Aluminium was “too little, too late”.  In terms of attracting new businesses to replace them the feeling was that too much money and effort was being spent on brushing up the appearance of the place (“they're more interested in making the backs of the buildings look nice for the ferries”) but not enough was being done to proactively support the existing small businesses or attract new enterprises which should provide the beating heart of any town. Unsurprisingly the Council and many of its members came in for severe criticism.

There are of course no silver bullets for the economic problems being faced in Holyhead or, indeed, all over Ynys Môn. But one thing is certain: you cannot continue to do the same things and expect different outcomes. The time has come to try something radically different and that is why I have been pushing for Holyhead to become the first Enterprise Zone in Wales. Announced in last month’s Budget, 21 Enterprise Zones will be set up in England, with the closest one to us being in Wirral Waters, Birkenhead. As Economic Development is devolved in Wales, WAG has now received £65m as the ‘Barnett consequential’ of this policy and it will be up to the new Welsh Government to decide post May 5th how to use this money. I sincerely hope that WAG will give serious thought to introducing a similar Enterprise Zone policy here in Wales due to their terrific potential to help revive some of our most economically struggling areas – and to this end,  I’m delighted that the Daily Post has also come out in support of my calls for Holyhead to become Wales’ first Enterprise Zone (see image above).

In terms of the specifics of Enterprise Zones, the Welsh Conservatives would push for the following:

• tax breaks for both existing and new businesses – including the lifting of business rates and discussions with Westminster on the possibility of also obtaining corporation tax reductions
• simplified planning rules to assist businesses setting up or expanding
• the roll out of super-fast broadband

It is also important to note that the benefits of having an Enterprise Zone in Holyhead would not be just confined to Holyhead. As Ynys Môn’s largest town, it is in the interests of the Island as a whole to have a thriving, profitable and growing economy in Holyhead. Enterprise Zones have their critics, but quite frankly, its time to try something new and radical in Holyhead: to simply carry on tinkering around the edges will not change anything.

A real legacy for Ynys Môn

A legacy to Ynys Môn? The Shell site in Rhosgoch. 

One of the more unpredictable side-effects of the heavy snow in December was that it forced a delay in the process of selling Anglesey Aluminium's Penrhos site. Whereas all bids were originally supposed to be in by January 10th, the snow made site visits by potential buyers impossible and consequently the deadline for bids was pushed back to last Friday. The Daily Post quotes a company source saying "the site had attracted strong interest from a range of industrial sectors" including "at least one wind turbine manufacturer and a smelting firm". My guess is that the wind turbine manufacturer involved is Windpower Wales.

There has been a suggestion trailed in the local press by the Labour party that Anglesey Aluminium shouldn't be selling the site but should instead donate it to the Island, similar to the way Shell donated its Rhosgoch tank farm site back in the 1970s. As this would effectively mean transferring the land to Anglesey County Council -- the same body which is currently riven once again by infighting and has failed over the decades to make any effective use of the Rhosgoch site whatsoever -- I would far prefer to see AAM sell the site on the open market to companies which can use it to bring work back to Holyhead as soon as possible.

In fact the prospectus of sale for the site contains some very unusual requirements for potential bidders which gives me great hope that it will not just be sold off to property developers for example. In addition to asking for audited accounts, bank details and so on, bidders are also required to provide the following information:

• Evidence of the company’s track record of purchasing, developing and managing large industrial complexes and sites, and the job creation/quality of jobs created that resulted from these projects.
• A maximum of three relevant examples of projects where you have worked in partnership with the public sector to deliver new employment and regeneration. Please confirm the company’s role and also provide details of the public sectors’ role in these projects including referees from whom we could take up references.

Doesn't sound like AAM is just planning to sell off the site to property developers, does it?

The best possible legacy which AAM could leave for Anglesey would be to ensure that the site is bought by companies which will use the Penrhos site and its infrastructure productively whilst also creating long term jobs. Lets hope that this happens.

Pass the parcel in Holyhead.

The row regarding who should fund extending the deep sea port in Holyhead to accommodate possible plans to convert the Anglesey Aluminium site in Holyhead into a wind turbine factory has erupted again. I have already previously written about it here and here and my views remain the same.

I would add this however: Ieuan Wyn Jones is this time quoted by the BBC as saying, "There is a fantastic potential for renewable energy projects but because ports are not a devolved issue, it is inappropriate for us to be allocating resources towards it". In other words, Ieuan Wyn Jones recognises what a fantastic opportunity this could be, but would rather try to score political points against Westminster than take action to create well paid jobs in one of the poorest towns in Wales.

Alex Salmond and Li Keqiang raising a glass
to scottish pragmatism (Photo: LA Times)

As it happens ports are not devolved in Scotland either but that has not stopped the Scottish Government strategically investing in their development. The Scots' pragmatic attitude was rewarded this week when the Vice Premier of China, Li Keqiang, started his four day trade visit to the UK in Edinburgh and signed a $10m renewables deal. Mr Li does not intend to visit Wales and Ieuan Wyn Jones's attitude makes it clear why.

Ynys Môn in 2011

Croeso i 2011

Blwyddyn Newydd Dda i chi gyd! Happy New Year to you all!

Making predictions is a perilous business -- however in order to understand what problems potentially lie ahead and to plan effectively to counter them we need to have a view of what to look out for over the year ahead. Accordingly I'm happy to stick my neck out and share with you what I think 2011 has in store for Ynys Môn:

Anglesey County Council

Wales's highest paid civil servant, David Bowles - the Assembly Government appointed Interim MD to IoACC - will certainly leave the council this year. His two year contract will end in September -- though he may very well leave even earlier in order to save costs. There will be no direct replacement; instead in all likelihood Gwynedd's Chief Executive Harry Thomas will take over the running of both Anglesey and Gwynedd with an Anglesey-based Deputy appointed from within IoACC. There will no doubt be a pruning of heads of departments as several functions are shared between Gwynedd and Anglesey.

Politically 2011 will be an unpredictable year for the Council. The departure of David Bowles will no doubt have a large impact on Councillors and it will be interesting to see if the contentious Terms of Engagement will survive him -- or whether Harry Thomas will be as keen to enforce them. It is also likely that 2011 will see the two Councillors reported to the Ombudsman have their day before Adjudication Panel for Wales -- leading to untold consequences inside the council chamber whatever the judgement.

The ruling Alliance, made up of Plaid Cymru, Labour, and two groups of Independents, is already suffering from a number of stress-fractures and it is difficult to see it surviving the year -- particularly considering that in addition to the changes outlined above it will also be forced to push through unpopular cuts. The local council elections in 2012 will begin to weigh ever heavier on Councillors minds as the year unfolds.

The Island Economy

2011 will be a very difficult year for the UK as the government begins to implement policies designed to reduce the national deficit, forcing us to come to terms with the systematic overspending of the past decade. Despite its status as the poorest place in the UK, Ynys Môn will not be immune to this process and will be affected by the VAT and fuel duty rises, changes to welfare payments, and reduced council services amongst others.

Fortunately there should be some light on the 'horizon' for the Island. Following the coalition government's quick action to both approve Wylfa as a 'preferred' nuclear location and introduce measures to ensure the profitability of low-carbon energy sources such as nuclear, 2011 should be the year when Horizon officially indicates it will proceed to build Wylfa B. This will provide a huge boost to Ynys Môn's ailing economy by providing in the short-term huge numbers of construction jobs -- hopefully coming in time to take the strain caused by job losses elsewhere. The construction phase will take several years and bring with it a large influx of workers which will boost Anglesey's retail and housing sectors in addition to other small businesses.

The other major employers on the Island -- the port of Holyhead and RAF Valley -- will hopefully not see any major changes in 2011. The Search and Rescue function will certainly be retained at Valley, whilst announcements regarding the future of the T Mk 1 Hawks are not expected until 2012. With regards to Holyhead, with traffic through the port anyway down since the collapse of building boom in Ireland, people who I have spoken to at the port don't believe that passenger numbers will be further affected by the current economic turmoil in Ireland -- which is cautiously good news.

However, in the long term, the most important sector for the Island economy in 2011 will be its small and medium sized indigenous businesses. In addition to the benefits they will accrue from the construction of Wylfa B, they will also be helped by the reduction in April 2011 of corporation tax for small businesses from 21% to 20% and the ongoing National Insurance holiday for new qualifying businesses outside of the South East. Unfortunately they will receive little help from the Welsh Assembly Government itself. Small businesses in Wales already pay higher business rates than anywhere else in the UK (in this context it should be noted that the Welsh Conservatives pledge to remove all small businesses with a rateable value below £10,000 out of business rates altogether -- benefitting approx. 19,000 North Wales small firms) and Ieuan Wyn Jones's misdirected Economic Renewal Programme has removed any support from Anglesey's small businesses through halving the total budget and then limiting all economic support to certain sectors only. Furthermore Ieuan Wyn Jones recent calls to delay income tax bills for small firms would do nothing but modify cash flow -- instead of an overall reduction in outflow, like a business rate reduction would do. We need to find ways of reducing bills for small businesses not simply moving the problem until later.

Môn Mam Cymru

Proportionately more people are employed in fields related to farming and agriculture on Anglesey than anywhere else in North Wales. Accordingly we need a healthy and profitable farming industry -- however Anglesey's farms will begin to come under great pressure towards the end of 2011. Single Farm Payments, worth around £10 million per annum to Ynys Môn, are denominated in Euros (at an exchange rate set on 30th September each year) and are therefore vulnerable to the current Euro crisis being played out on the continent. Should other Eurozone countries join Greece and Ireland then it is possible that the sterling value of Single Farm Payments scheduled for December 2011 will be much reduced. On top of this WAG's new agri-environment scheme 'Glastir'  -- which will eventually replace the existing four schemes (Tir Mynydd, Tir Cynnal, Tir Gofal, and the Organic Farming Scheme) -- has been lambasted by farmers for offering too little financial incentive compared to the amount of work required to qualify. So few farmers have applied that WAG has been forced to U-turn on its proposals to begin phasing out Tir Mynydd payments (received by 420 Anglesey farms) this year. However without major changes to Glastir in 2011 farmers will see their incomes further reduced in coming years.

Tourism

Tourism brings in approx. £215m per annum for Ynys Môn and has become increasingly more and more important to the Island economy. The Royal Wedding and presence on Anglesey of William and Kate in 2011 will provide us with an unrivalled window of opportunity to boost tourism for a generation -- but only if we make the right decisions early in 2011. The council needs to recognise this opportunity and implement a short-term tourism strategy designed to 'sell' the island globally over the next 12 months. Furthermore council plans to offload the various tourist attractions it currently runs should be suspended until 2012 at least unless suitable and stable partners can be found with the means and desire to run them well. My recommendations in full are here.

Island House Prices

According to the latest Halifax Country House Price survey the average house price in Anglesey in 2010 fell from £164,300 to £145,147 -- the equivalent of a 11.7% drop. As far as I am concerned this is good news for the Island as it brings the house price to earnings ratio marginally down from 6.7x to 5.6x.

The media is suggesting that the presence of William and Kate will make property on the island attractive to certain second home hunters thus pushing up prices in 2011. The probable beginning of an influx of workers for Wylfa B will also lead to house price inflation -- making it absolutely imperative that the joint LDP between Anglesey and Gwynedd frees up enough land for the building of new houses to keep prices stable. The whole issue of Affordable Homes on Ynys Môn is something I intend to return to shortly.

Elections and Referendums

There will the two referendums held in 2011: the vote on extra powers for the Welsh Assembly will be won, the nationwide poll on changing the first-past-the-post election system to AV will be lost. The Welsh Assembly election in May on Ynys Môn will be very, very close. I will do everything I can to provide a local, Welsh, energetic alternative to a tired Ieuan Wyn Jones. Whatever the result, I promise to make sure that the issues of jobs and the Island economy will be at the very top of the agenda -- ensuring that whoever succeeds at the polls, Ynys Môn will be the winner.

I would be very interested in hearing your predictions for 2011...

From Aluminium to Data?

For Sale: the Anglesey Aluminium site in Penrhos,  Holyhead

If you have deep enough pockets, below you can find the sales prospectus for Anglesey Aluminum's Penrhos site near Holyhead. The total land comes to 33.5 Hectares (184 acres), with 114,781 sqm (1,235,500 sqft) of internal floorspace within the various buildings on the site. AAM will continue to operate a re-melt facility at the site on land rented back from the eventual purchaser. Furthermore, a portion of the land has been earmarked for a biomass plant pending planning permission. AAM have already commenced the decommissioning of the remainder of the site which will take up to 18 months to complete. According to the Daily Post, offers are expected in the region of £10m -- the equivalent of approx. £54K per acre.

Apparently the site has already attracted significant interest from energy and fabrication firms -- indeed, the sales prospectus confidently informs readers that "Expressions of Interest are to be submitted ... by 12.00 Noon on Monday 10th January 2011", in triplicate.

One of the most important aspects of the site's infrastructure is its direct 120MW connection to Wylfa nuclear power station. When operational, Anglesey Aluminium used to use up to 20% of the total electricity consumed daily in Wales. Accordingly possibly the most suitable use for the site would be for a business which requires both huge amounts of energy coupled with an uninterruptible connection to the grid. A regular commenter on this blog has suggested that a Data Centre could fit this bill.

The trend towards cloud computing means that Data Centres -- gigantic, secure facilities which house thousands of computer systems and servers -- are becoming more and more important. Indeed one such plant, the £200m Next Generation Data Centre, was recently completed with some WAG support on the site of an ex-LG factory in Newport, South Wales. As the AAM plant already enjoys a direct electricity supply from Wylfa, has potential access to the "fibrespeed" fibre-optic network already installed at the adjacent Parc Cybi, and access to sea water for cooling purposes, might a Data Centre not only be a suitable use for the site but also provide much needed skilled work in the region too?

Anglesey Aluminium For Sale

Helping Holyhead and Ynys Môn to create jobs

According to figures compiled by the GMB Union, Holyhead has the most jobseekers per vacancy in Wales. This month there are 781 unemployed claimants in Holyhead chasing just 105 unfilled job vacancies -- a ratio of 7.4 potential applicants per job. Bangor, Caernarfon and Llangefni are in 17th place, with 2,138 unemployed claimants chasing 1,077 job vacancies -- a ratio of 2 applicants per job.

Holyhead in particular was severely hit by the recession -- two of its largest employers, both of which had been operating in Holyhead for well over 35 years -- closed within three months of each other at the end of 2009:

• Anglesey Aluminium started smelting in 1971 and continued production all the way through the 80s and 90s, only closing with a loss of 450 jobs in September 2009
• The Eaton Electric plant in Holyhead opened in 1960 under the name Midland Electric Manufacturing Company, it operated all through the 80s and 90s and closed in December 2009 with a loss of 250 jobs

Between them they directly accounted for 700 jobs, not including all the other jobs in small suppliers, support industries, and shops which depended on their trade.

Large companies like Anglesey Aluminium and Eaton Electric cannot be replaced overnight, and it is for that reason that the economic wellbeing of Holyhead and Anglesey must rest with its indigenous small businesses -- a point explicitly addressed in the People's Manifesto:

"the Council needs to recognise that the Island’s economic future rests on promoting and supporting multitudes of small businesses - not just one or two large employers. Accordingly the Council must: (a) avoid supporting developments which merely contribute to the cannibalisation of sales from existing small businesses and shops; (b) prioritise reducing the bureaucracy and costs involved in running small businesses on the Island; (c) provide meaningful and high-quality support to encourage both the growth of existing small businesses and the establishment of new ventures."

Not only does this make good common-sense, it is also backed up by research: for example studies show that nearly two-thirds of all net new jobs in the United States in 2007 were created by companies less than five years old. Therefore it is clear that a country such as Wales which suffers from an under-developed private sector should strategically focus on providing support to its small businesses as a way of growing the number of private sector jobs.

Unfortunately the economic development policies currently being pursued by the Welsh Assembly Government -- Ieuan Wyn Jones's "Economic Renewal Programme" -- do the exact opposite: i.e. they support a few large employers in Wales at the expense of the multitudes of small businesses. It has done this by limiting the amount of economic support available and then restricted it only to companies operating in six "key sectors":

• Creative industries
• Information Communication Technologies
• Energy and Environment
• Advanced material and manufacturing
• Life Sciences
• Financial and Professional services

How were these sectors chosen? Nobody knows. The majority of companies operating in these sectors are not small companies. And most importantly to us, none of them (with the possible exception of energy companies) are well represented on Ynys Môn as is clear from the following breakdown of workplace employment sectors in Anglesey and North Wales:

In case you can't read the key: the sectors (left to right) are: Public Administration, education,
health and other services; Agriculture, hunting, forestry and fishing; Production; Construction;
Distribution, transport and communication; Finance and business services. (Source: WAG)

As you can see: Anglesey has a large distribution and transport sector thanks to Holyhead port, fair sized construction and production industries (although this data was collated before the closure of AAM and Eaton, etc.), and the largest proportion of people in North Wales working in areas related to agriculture and food production. None of these sectors are supported by the Economic Renewal Programme and therefore do not qualify for any support. Financial services are supported but, as you can see, Anglesey has the lowest proportion of these companies in the whole of North Wales.

As Anglesey has the highest proportion of people working in Agriculture sector in North Wales it is also important to note that there are severe problems here also. Single Farm payments are denominated in Euros, whose value is falling against sterling because of economic turmoil in Europe. Furthermore the current existing WAG agri-environmental schemes (Tir Gofal, Tir Mynydd, Tir Cynnal, and the Organic farming Scheme) are in the process of being phased out and replaced by the over complicated and widely derided Glastir scheme.  Indeed at a meeting I recently attended of the Anglesey Grassland Society, out of approximately 40 farmers present, only one said he was applying for Glastir. There is trouble ahead.

So what can be done to help the situation in Holyhead and the rest of Ynys Môn?

• WAG needs to change its focus to supporting our small indigenous Welsh businesses. It can do this by reviewing the focus of the Economic Renewal Programme and also by reviewing Business Rates -- which are currently higher in Wales than anywhere else in the UK. (the Welsh Conservatives plan to take all small companies with a rateable value of less than £12,000 out of paying business rates all together).
• More needs to be done to ensure that European funds like JEREMIE (of which Anglesey firms have so far only received 0.1% of the funds available in Wales) are better advertised and taken up by Anglesey companies.
• Closer to home, Anglesey County Council needs to recognise the dangerous effect which expanding the number of pay and display car parks will have on struggling town centre businesses. Gwynedd Council has made all car parks free during the Xmas period to help their small businesses -- why can't we do the same here? I will be pushing the Council to reconsider parking charges entirely.
• Noting the importance of Agricultural and food-based businesses in particular to Anglesey, WAG needs to consider the effectiveness of Glastir. Closer to home we need to look at how we can promote Anglesey produce better.
• Tourism will become more and more important to the Island. I have already discussed here what can be done to help the industry on Anglesey.
• And finally, Planning policies on the island needs to become more business friendly. Present policies are based on the adopted Ynys Môn Local Plan (1996) and the stopped Unitary Development Plan (2005) -- both of these documents are seriously outdated in all areas. Accordingly we need to ensure there is sufficient consultation into the new Local Development Plan (currently being jointly produced with Gwynedd Council) to make sure that planning represents Anglesey's modern needs.

If you have any more ideas or suggestions, please do let me know.

The Irish Bailout and Holyhead

The economic problems facing the Republic of Ireland are immense and especially worrying for us on Ynys Môn considering how much the Port of Holyhead relies upon a steady flow of people and cargo between us and the Irish ports of Dublin and Dun Laoghaire. Holyhead is in fact the busiest ferry port in Wales handling around 2.3 million passenger movements each year and sustaining approximately 900 jobs -- well over half of those with Stena, and the remainder with Irish Ferries, port service companies, and various other transport businesses. In 2009, according the latest figures available from the Department of Transport, Holyhead Port handled a total of 2.85 million tonnes -- the vast majority of it roll on/roll off. All of this injects much needed money in to Anglesey's fragile economy.

Of course Ireland is not just important to Holyhead and Anglesey, it is also one of the UK's largest trading partners. British exports to Ireland are three times British exports to China and five times the exports to India, furthermore Irish trade exceeds total UK trade with the emerging markets of Brazil, Russia, India and China put together. For these reasons I am pleased to see that the UK Government is prepared to help Eire and hope that this along with the IMF loans will help to buffer any possible knock-on effects on ferry traffic at Holyhead.

Any port in a (funding) storm. (Updated)

I wrote back in March this year about the Offshore Wind Site Development Competition organised by the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) to allocate £60m of funds to help port authorities and developers looking to develop new offshore wind manufacturing and assembly facilities. Ports which wished to apply had to prove that they:

• have access to sufficient land that could be developed into wind turbine manufacturing facilities;
• are suitable for the transport of large and heavy products;
• and already have heavy duty surfacing capable of bearing heavy loads in place. 

There was much hope at the time that, in line with the Energy Island concept, Holyhead's now defunct Anglesey Aluminium plant, which has a deep water dock, would be a very suitable location.

Happily the £60m funds have survived the Comprehensive Spending Review and the competition is still open -- although it has now emerged that because this is classed as 'business support' (i.e. a devolved function) the lions share of the £60m will be reserved for England with only Barnett consequentials available to Wales, Scotland and Northern Island. The good news is this guarantees that the Welsh Assembly will receive £3.5m towards developing a Welsh port (and just by looking at the adjacent map, it can only really be Holyhead). The bad news however is that no matter how eligible or suitable Holyhead may appear, it cannot receive any more than that amount. This has cued outrage from Albert Owen, who has said this is "another example of the Tories and Liberals marginalising Wales", whereas Ieuan Wyn Jones, asserts the decision shows a "complete lack of respect" for the Welsh economy.

My personal view is that its highly unlikely that £3.5m alone will be anywhere near enough money to properly transform the Anglesey Aluminium plant and dock into one suitable for manufacturing and shipping offshore wind turbines. Accordingly it would have been far better for the government to take a more strategic view and divide the total budget between the two or three most suitable ports (no matter in which region they are located) so that the sums each location received would be sufficient enough to deliver a considerable impact.

However -- and here's a novel thought -- instead of forever whinging about supposed slights by the coalition government, why doesn't the Welsh Assembly Government step up and show us that it can take action when required? WAG has a £15bn budget; of that approximately £1.2bn is earmarked for Economic Development and Transport. As Ieuan Wyn Jones has announced that half the Economic Development budget will now be spent on as yet undefined infrastructure projects, why can't some £11.5m of this money (i.e. 9 percent) be added to the £3.5m from DECC to make a pot of £15m for developing Holyhead port? Presumably an investment of this kind could help make Holyhead the key staging area for 'Round 3' offshore wind farms in the Irish Sea -- whilst also supporting the development of a sustainable new industry in the UK's poorest area.

The Welsh Assembly has been only too happy to waste our money on expanding mostly unnecessary universal benefits (such as free prescriptions and free breakfasts for primary school children) which neither generate jobs nor possible future sustainable revenue streams for Wales. Its time for WAG to get its priorities in order, stop using the excuse that it is 'underfunded' (according to the Holtham Report, through the Barnett Formula Wales receives £112 for every £100 spend on devolved activities in England) and go out an earn the 'respect' it says it deserves.

UPDATE: I am grateful to commenters who point out that the Port of Mostyn near Holywell, with ready access to the A55, M62, M56, and M6, is already well ahead in establishing itself as the ideal servicing location for offshore wind farms in the East Irish Sea. This clearly shows that for Holyhead to compete, DECC/WAG support to modify the port will be meaningless unless it first manages to attract wind turbine manufacturers to set up production operations in the town. Just before the election there were a number of front page stories in the Daily Post about how the then Welsh Secretary, Peter Hain, was in talks with a unnamed company to set up just such a wind turbine factory on the Anglesey Aluminium site. Hain even described it as "the beginning of good times" for Anglesey -- though predictably, as sure as today's front pages become tomorrow fish'n'chips wrappers, we never heard anything about the whole thing ever again.

I think that the 'Energy Island' concept is a good one, and, in theory, Anglesey is ideally located to take advantage of a trend towards lower carbon energy sources, be they nuclear or renewable marine technologies. But as I have written previously:

"For the Energy Island concept to be a full success Anglesey must become an originator of energy technology -- not just a destination for off-island companies to place various schemes. Accordingly the council must work to incubate Anglesey-based energy start-ups. The only way to do this would be to work with local research centres, such as Bangor University, to develop some kind of Energy Science Park located somewhere on the Island. I would further suggest that using the "Shell Fund" to provide "seed money" for such start ups would be a far more productive use of the money then purely funnelling the majority of it into Oriel Môn each year."

Can Holyhead learn from Liverpool?

Holyhead Town Centre: terminal decline?

Last week we looked at some policy ideas which might help Anglesey have the best of both worlds: vibrant, profitable town centres AND the choice and convenience of out-of-town superstores. However, the problem with our proposed solution is that it is already too late to implement because most of Anglesey's major towns already have a variety of large out/edge-of-town superstores whilst shops in town centres are already in desperate decline. Its clear therefore that we need solutions which are more suitable for reviving our already suffering high streets - and nowhere is that needed more on Anglesey than in Holyhead where at least 40 per cent of town centre shops appear to be currently derelict.

Liverpool One: a shopping mall integrated into the City Centre

The Druid thinks that a possible solution might lie in another not-so-far-away port town: Liverpool. Not so long ago Liverpool's town centre - like many other parts of the city - was also suffering from gradual decline with unkempt and unattractive streets, a dwindling number of shops, and gradually less and less shoppers. All of these factors made the city centre unappealing to new high quality retailers and the opening of the Trafford Centre outside Manchester sucked up all the regional shopping business. Clearly building a similar self-contained shopping mall on the outskirts of Liverpool would further exasperate the problems in the city centre, therefore Liverpool City Council embarked on an astoundingly radical plan called the Paradise Project. Centred around Paradise Street, a satellite street from the city centre, Liverpool City Council redeveloped a staggering 42 acres of land and essentially constructed an open air shopping mall similar in scale to the Trafford Centre, but one which was located in the heart of the city and which seamlessly integrated into the city centre itself. Liverpool One, as it is called, is now completed and is composed of 30 buildings, 160 shops, more than 500 apartments and two hotels. Since its completion, not only Liverpool One but the rest of the town centre too has seen a marked increase in the numbers of shoppers and the opening of new shops.

Could such a scheme revive Holyhead's fortunes? With over two million travellers passing through the ferry-port every year there is certainly a potentially attractive market in Holyhead which could be tapped to possibly make such a scheme viable. The pedestrian bridge from the port to the town centre already exists - the problem is that there is nothing attractive there to tempt visitors. However with a very large number of shops on Market Street currently closed, is there an opportunity for Anglesey County Council to work with a private developer to purchase a large chunk of Market Street, adjacent to the pedestrian bridge, and redevelop it along the lines of Liverpool One? Private developers have shown an interest in building a retail village on Anglesey previously (notably at Tŷ Mawr), so why can one not be built which is actually integrated into the High Street of Anglesey's largest town, rather than in an out-of-town location where it would just further cannibalise local businesses? Liverpool One cost in total £920 million to develop - thats a huge sum of money, but according to the blurb in the Holyhead Forward plan, they have already spent £67million in Holyhead between 2003-06 with no discernible improvement to the town centre at all - arguably it is worse now than previously. I know there are no doubt lots of reasons why it can't be done - but surely the time has come for some radical, new thinking in Holyhead? The truth is that all the brand workshops in the world will not save Holyhead unless we stop doing what we have always done and instead try something completely different. As always I look forward to your learned comments.


P.S. I will be away for the next couple of days so blogging may be light.