Fighting Objective One Job Closures in Porthmadog

Plaid MP for Caernarfon, Hywel Williams, today met with officials from HMRC to argue the case for keeping open the HMRC offices in North-West Wales.

Much of the discussion was regarding the future position of the Welsh language centre at Ty Moelwyn in Porthmadog, which now looks likely to be retained despite the 'efficiency savings' being made by HMRC that are closing tax offices through much of rural Wales.

Hywel argued the case for further development of the Welsh language services at the centre, noting the current trends for the ability to use Welsh amongst younger people - who will be paying their taxes for a long time yet, and for it to remain based in Gwynedd rather than see the jobs transferred to Cardiff or Wrexham.

Sadly, on the issue of Objective One (or convergence funding) jobs, Labour's left hand doesn't know what the right is doing - using European money to fund new jobs in less well-off areas but stripping them of the skilled and professional jobs that already exist.