Parliamentary Constituencies and Assembly Electoral Regions (Wales) (Amendment) Order 2008

As the Minister has said, I have a declared interest in that I was the former Member for Brecon and Radnorshire, in which that community exists. Neither I nor my successor in the other place, Roger Williams, have any objection to the order. We have a very large constituency in Brecon and Radnorshire; in fact it is the largest constituency by geographical area in England and Wales, and about the fourth largest in Great Britain. This part is in the far south-west corner of the Brecon and Radnorshire constituency; it is an old mining community. As is typical of the valleys of south Wales, the communities there follow one after another up the valley. On 1 April 2005, there was a boundary change for the local authorities. In that boundary change, part of Cwmtwrch was transferred from Ystaly Fera, which is in the Swansea Valley, to Ystrad Gynlais, which is part of the Brecon and Radnorshire constituency. That was altered by the Neath Port Talbot and Powys (Cwmtwrch) Order 2004. I will not digress too far, except to explain that there are two Cwmtwrchs. There is a famous story in Wales of an Indian restaurateur who went back to India and was discussing where he came from. He said to his old friend, ““I live in Cwmtwrch””. His friend said, ““Upper or lower?”” That is a classic story in both Welsh and English in Wales. The result of the order is that the whole of the land on one side of the Twrch Valley would be transferred into Powys. Logic follows that the statutory instrument before us today changes the electoral boundaries, which will now be contiguous with the local authority boundaries. That is widely welcomed in the valley because it is a valley community and a Welsh-speaking community at that. It is a very warm and friendly place, especially in Cwmtwrch, whether Upper or Lower. The river Twrch, which runs into the Tawe—which, if you translate it from the Welsh, means that it is a wild boar—comes right off the Carmarthenshire Black Mountain. In other words, it races down the valley in a flood and turmoil, a bit like a pig ferreting around in a field; there are masses of round boulders in the river and you cannot walk across it in the flood; you would not survive. The inhabitants can on occasion hear the roar of the river and one living in that excellent community with his wife is none other than Clive Rowlands, the Welsh rugby captain, who was known as ““Top Cat”” and was the coach of the British Lions. There is a very good rugby club in Cwmtwrch; you get a warm welcome there if you go. It is that kind of place and those kind of people. The other remarkable thing that is a prime example to the population of the rest of the entire United Kingdom is that, in my experience, on two or three occasions, 95 per cent of the electorate there came out to vote at the general election. I wish that that were the case in the rest of the United Kingdom.