| GLYNNEATH BY-ELECTION 29 July 2021 Candidate - Dai Richards - Glynneath Residents Against Contamination | ||
| vid | My name is Dai Richards and I'm standing in the Glynneath Town Council by-election this Thursday. When you see me around Glynneath, this is what I look like, today I'm clean shaven for effect, but normally I'll have 2-10 days of stubble on my chin, just like this. I moved to Glynneath to be closer to the Brecon Beacons. | |
| vid | This is what I love, I love the mountains, swimming in the lakes at sunrise and walking the waterfalls in flood, I love to be a part of nature, to be at one with this amazing planet, and I want to enjoy my remaining days left on this earth. | |
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I'm 61 years old and apart from living 5 years in Swansea I've lived all my life in Neath-Port Talbot and the last 14 in Brynhyfryd, Glynneath. | |
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My family hail from Neath and in 1891 all 4 sets of my great grandparents lived near Neath town centre. | |
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These are my great great grandparents, Thomas & Elizabeth Snow. Thomas Snow is credited with building Victoria Gardens in Neath Town Centre. | |
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I'm best known for my prowess as a sportsman, I've represented Wales at Cyclo Cross | |
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Triathlon | |
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Mountain Running | |
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Marathon Kayaking | |
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Duathlon (combined running and cycling) | |
| vid | and Mountain Biking. This is me in red top & pink shorts, riding for Wales in the 1996 Mountain Bike Tour of Britain where I finished the leading rider in the Welsh team. | |
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I rode 6 years as a sponsored rider for the Schmoo's Mountain Bike Team, travelling the length & breadth of Britain to race against professional teams such as Raleigh, Marin & Peugeout with the occasional magazine photo shoot included. | |
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During this period of my life I also worked as a Physical Training Instructor with the Territorial Army, winning the major British Military mountain running competition, the Welsh 1000 metre peaks race twice in succession, running from the sea near Bangor to the top of Snowdon and the Territorial Army Triathlon Championships for the first 4 years of its existence. I also spent time perfecting other military skills. |
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In 2000, near Prague in the Czech Republic, I won the veteran over 40 title in the World Quadrathlon Championships combining kayaking with the three triathlon sports.. | |
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In 2009, Inside Sport Magazine named me the Wales' Fittest Man. I was 16 years past my best by that time and had retired to focus on developing sport locally so that my children could enjoy a healthy lifestyle. | |
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I live with my wife Hayley and we have 4 children, 3 of whom have represented
Wales and/or Great Britain, Simon & Dale at orienteering, Dale at cyclo
cross 2, Victoria represented Wales and Great Britain at slalom kayak and in
2017 Victoria was a member of the Great Britain women's
team that won a gold medal in the slalom discipline at the World White Water rafting
championships in Japan so we have another
World Champion in the family. She is pictured in the front left of the raft.
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Two of my children are respected scientists, they both have a PhD in chemistry, Dr Simon contributed a chapter to the Royal Society of Chemistry Perodical, Organometallic Chemistry in 2020 and Dr Victoria is the chief editor of the chemistry journal Nature Chemistry Communications. | |
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I worked at Neath Port Talbot College managing the first college Triathlon Academy in Britain and to support the Academy I built a feeder system for junior triathletes. In 2005, 75% of Welsh age group champions were from the academy feeder system. At the same time I was chairman of Wales' largest and most successful club of that period based in Neath, Multisport Racing Club. | |
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I work occasionally as a sports coach and my day job is running the world's leading supplier of Rugby Memorabilia, Rugby Relics. This is a company I started from a shoebox of spare rugby programmes 43 years ago back in 1978. We sell all kinds of rugby memorabilia and have an on-line museum of memorabilia. We exhibited our collection of artefacts in the 125th and 130th Welsh Rugby Union Anniversary exhibitions. I've also written a book on the Origin of Sport which explains the birth of Rugby Union. |
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For fun I work as an extra in television and movie productions including Casualty, Sherlock and the locally filmed Pride where I was featured in the first scene filmed, if you have the DVD, I'm the first person you see when you put it on. I appear to the right Bill Nighy in this promo photo. | |
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This is my family, my wife Hayley and I and our direct descendants, together with their partners we are 13 in total. | |
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We moved to Glynneath in 2007 and up until 2016 with the occasional hiccough I kept myself to myself and I enjoyed living in Glynneath until the Cuddy Group started building a mountain of Aberfan proportions behind our homes. |
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In 2020 my research into the planning process relating to the Heol y Glyn development has identified malpractice in the Neath-Port Talbot Council Planning Department that has led to contamination being ignored on the site as opposed to being treated and cleaned up or removed in line with the council's Contaminated Land Strategy and UK Government law. The council have in effect failed to safeguard the health of the residents surrounding the site. |
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Early on in the planning process residents from 20 properties asked me to represent them in objecting against the format of the Heol y Glyn Development. I have supported these residents since then. This is me in a planning meeting doing the job of Glynneath Councillors who are the only ones from Glynneath supporting the development. The council does not like plain speaking and the truth, so they have blocked me from asking any more questions relating to the development. This is why I need to become a councillor so that I can ask these questions officially and not as a member of the public. |
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Recently I have discovered that 20% of properties in Brynhyfryd that have long term occupancy and a physical border with the site have had a family member die of a rare neurodegenerative disorder in the last 5 years. This is 112 times above the national average and some of these deaths can be linked to a similar example of industrial contamination in a French town. In a nutshell what I am saying here is that Neath-Port Talbot Council are potentially killing Glynneath residents to support their own historical corruption. |
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I'll give you a second or two to digest this
information..................................
I would consider myself to have reasonably successful in achieving my life's goals. This is not through being lucky or having the boxes ticked for me by someone else. It's through sheer hard work, attention to detail and an aptitude for understanding the steps required to achieve those goals. If you've watched this video to this point, please understand that the video is not an advertisement for my arrogance. The video is a demonstration of a series of successful processes that I and my family have completed in a world that celebrates winners not losers. Achieving success is a process and the skills involved within that process are transferable and can be applied to solve community problems as well as to enhance community projects. |
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The residents of the Central Ward of Glynneath have the opportunity to have me working for you by voting for me this Thursday. | |
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Please vote for me so that I may help this community to achieve its goals and to achieve success, and please vote for me to support the families of the Glynneath Residents Against Contamination Group who's lives are being threatened by a corrupt council. This Thursday, please vote for Dai Richards. Thank you. www.dai-richards.wales |
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This video is an election communication, produced and published by Dai Richards, 66 Brynhyfryd, Glynneath |
