Local Assembly Member Paul Davies has held a debate in the Assembly Chamber on the Welsh Government’s plans to create a ‘Dyfed –style authority’ by merging Pembrokeshire, Carmarthenshire and Ceredigion. Mr Davies stressed the importance of keeping the ‘local’ in local government and argued against proposals to see services centralised away from Pembrokeshire.

Mr Davies said, “I’m extremely disappointed by the Minister’s response to my debate. It’s quite clear that the Minister does not take the genuine concerns of my constituents seriously. 74% of respondents to my County-wide survey were against any plans by the Welsh Government to merge Pembrokeshire with Ceredigion and Carmarthenshire and the Welsh Government must respond to those concerns.”

He added, “The Welsh Government’s plans to centralise public services in west Wales seems to have no bounds – we’ve already seen their attempts to take away health services and now they want to merge local authorities and once again move services further away from the people of Pembrokeshire. This is simply unacceptable – not only will these plans, if implemented, damage Pembrokeshire’s global brand, they will also impact local democracy and see decisions taken away from local people.”

“This is not a party political issue - the campaign against a Dyfed model has been supported by politicians of all colours and I hope that the Welsh Government recognises that. More importantly, however, these plans are not wanted by the people of Pembrokeshire and I want to make it absolutely clear that I will continue fighting to protect the Pembrokeshire identity and our local democracy.”