Residents of Gelligaer will demonstrate before a Caerphilly County Borough Council planning committee meeting next week.
A group of demonstrators have announced their intention to protest outside Ty Penallta on Wednesday, August 15.
The protest will take place prior to a planning committee meeting which will decide whether to grant the Bryn Group planning permission to continue relocating a screening bund at their quarry.
The Bryn Group have attracted anger from residents of Gelligaer following reports of an “unbearable” smell and dust coming from the group’s quarry and recycling plant in the village.
Residents held a public meeting with Caerphilly MP Wayne David on Monday, August 6, voicing ongoing concerns of dust and noise pollution coming from the site.
Wayne David MP told Caerphilly Observer: “The meeting was very well attended, with around 70 members of the public expressing genuine concern.
“I was left in absolute conviction that people are genuinely concerned and I have made a commitment to pursue these concerns alongside Hefin David AM and the ward’s councillors.”
Mr David also confirmed he has received an invitation from Bryn Group to visit the site, and will attend at the earliest appropriate date.
Local resident Harriet Weyman welcomed Mr David’s attendance at the meeting and said: “The meeting went really well. We fired a lot of questions at him and our concerns regarding Bryn Group and the council’s planning meeting. He is going to try and answer all of our concerns and come back to us in around six weeks time for a follow up meeting.”
The Bryn Group have previously blamed the smell on peat fires in the area, and attempted to assure residents that dust levels are under control and the rat problem is not due to their site.
A spokeswoman for the Bryn Group said they were aware of the meeting with Mr David and blamed a lack of communication between Bryn Group and residents for the issues.
She said: “If the residents want a Bryn representative at their meetings then I am more then willing to attend.
“I feel that a lot of the issue is that the communication between the site and the residents is so poor. We took part in the Bryn Compost Liaison Group for years, and have now set up the Bryn Discussion Group, and yet the information given by ourselves in these talks is not getting to the residents.
“I contacted local councillors directly before the previous meeting to say that if there were any questions or information they need to get in touch but they haven’t even acknowledged the email. I feel that this shows a compete lack of willingness on their behalf to even start the line of communication.”
The Bryn Group have confirmed that there will be a representative from themselves present at the committee meeting.
This has been a problem for over 10 years now! Up until about January this year, the smell was the only thing that residents were protesting. Now, it’s about the silica dust in the air, that fact that cows supplying Sainsbury’s with their milk are grazing on toxic land and that when Mr.Price is blasting for stone it’s literally cracking the houses in the area. Those issues are the tip of the iceberg, anybody who really wants to know what’s going on, join us at 4pm in 15th August 2018 at the council offices in tredomen and speak to the residents themselves.
Notice on this article how much they’ve quoted the manager (daughter of Mr.Price by the way), and how they’re talking about lines of communication, it’s all crap!!!
Thank you Nicola or giving a local viewpoint. Good communication is important in these matters and you rightly highlight ‘lines of communication’ which is a BS way of talking as is the use of ‘ourselves’ instead of the normal English language ‘us’
Best of luck to you and the local people concerned with this problem.