North Wales MS Mark Isherwood has today spoken at a North Wales event celebrating the Building Communities Trust ‘Invest Local Programme’, which builds on the strengths, skills and talents of individuals, groups and organisations in 13 communities across Wales, including three in North Wales (Maesgeirchen, Bangor, Plas Madoc, Wrexham, and Colwyn Bay).
Funded via a Lottery endowment, this ten-year programme provides funding and support for the communities, providing an opportunity for everyone living in them to make their local area an even better place to live by spending on local priorities.
At the event ‘Celebrating and Evaluating Seven Years of the Invest Local programme’, Mr Isherwood spoke of two of the programmes in North Wales, Colwyn Bay and Plas Madoc, Wrexham, and praised the fantastic community champions working in all 13 of the Invest Local areas.
He also highlighted the challenges they have faced.
He said:
“The Invest Local programme builds on the strengths, skills and talents of individuals, groups and organisations in those communities to create positive and long-lasting change.
“Each community decides how they want their areas to develop, how the money will be used, which organisations they want to work with, and how decisions are made.
“This is about improving community cohesion and allowing local communities to take control of shaping the area they live in.”
He said many of the 13 areas are now thinking about what happens after the Invest Local Programme ends, and that a full evaluation of the programme, entitled Weathering the Storm, has flagged the risk of community-based work not being sustainable after then.
He said:
“The evaluation found that more broadly they recognise the dependence of the programme on relatively small groups of volunteers, whose numbers have fluctuated.
“However, I have been impressed by both the social entrepreneurship and the proactive approach of future funding exhibited by the people I have met when visiting Invest Local Communities.
“Early this summer, I visited “Together for Colwyn Bay”, which is supported by the Building Communities Trust’s Invest Local programme.
“During my visit, we discussed their plans to support the work required to start regenerating the town centre and providing greater opportunities for local people through the development of a community centre.
“One of the issues that they flagged was the large number of commercial properties which lie empty, despite local interest in leasing or purchasing them, potentially resulting in them slipping into disrepair and the landlords apparent ambivalence around this situation.
“I was also shown an adjacent building where owners had transferred ownership to other companies under the same control to effectively “restart the clock” on arrangements for compulsory purchase while the building deteriorates.
“I subsequently wrote to the Minister for Climate Change regarding this.
“In her response, the Minister stated “Officials would welcome the opportunity to meet with T4CB and the Building Communities Trust to discuss regeneration in Colwyn Bay town centre and a course of action going forward”.
“In October, I also visited the Invest Local programme in Plas Madoc, for an informative meeting with ‘We Are Plas Madoc’, local residents, the Building Communities Trust and AVOW’s Play Department Manager and Plas Madoc Community Development Manager.
“During my visit, I was greatly impressed by the community champions I met and the wide range of key services they provide for people in their community of all ages.
“However, although they seek to sustain and develop their services, thereby taking further resource pressure off the Local Authority, I was concerned to see that their only “community hub” premises was an old container.
“Although they are providing a range of services from this, including affordable food, well-being and befriending, skills and activities, and youth provision, as well as a warm hub when the weather is cold, the container only has safe capacity for six people, has no toilets, and is cold in winter.
“I have since written to the Chief Executive of Wrexham Council regarding this stating “they therefore need a new premises from which to sustain and develop their essential service provision, working with the community and alongside the Local Authority as they take further pressure of Local Authority services”, and await his response.
Mr Isherwood concluded by congratulated Building Communities Trust on their work and praising “the fantastic community champions working in the 13 Invest Local areas, including the three in North Wales, for all you are doing”.