Welsh Overcast No.5

Today 350 Wales and west delegates are meeting at a conference to discuss harmonizing the neighboring economies of Bristol, Cardiff and Newport. The talks are meant to help the communities strengthen economic links between themselves, and increase consumer/producer activity in the area after bridge tolling is phased out late 2018. The bridge tolling has been a glass wall between cost effective markets growing between the areas, and with them gone will essentially be removing a trade barrier.

In other news Andrew Barry of Merthy Tydfill Council is slamming project managers who have left a half million gap in annual budgets already this year. A project being undergone to rebuild Brandy Bridge in Merthy Tydfill has gone £313,000 over budget. And a project intended to Pontygwaith Highway has gone over budget by £176,000! Leaving local councils concerned about over expenses.

The over expenditure has been related to inaccuracies and incomplete pre-project data and information, and has left the constructors to need to purchase more equipment than originally stated. Yet this matter is consequently going to restrict the council's budget further this year, and it is in the best interest of residents that the council launches an official inquiry into these matters.

And just as the government decides to spend an extra £500,000 on rebuilding bridges on top of initial budgets, schools are forced to take less money than they did the last year in most area's. A concerning area of under funding evident in the school system is a grant intended to provide learning assistance to children whose first language wasn't English. This grant allows foreign children to be educated to their fullest potential, and allows them to achieve attainment equal of their British counterparts.

The budget is meant to see a £2 million shortfall this year, and will affect many areas of benefit to children's education and ability to attain in higher education. Education Secretary Kirsty Williams has said that the grant will still provide £10 million to ethnic and minority children, despite cuts. Yet MP's, AM's and citizens alike aren't too convinced of the reasoning behind cutting such a budget. With many concerned that educational rights and provision's will be sacrificed in the precedence this will set for future government looking to crop expenditures.