AMs Back Carno Station Petitioners

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Thu 25th Jun 2009

Carno Station Action Group meet Assembly Members outside the Senedd

Members of the National Assembly Enterprise and Learning Committee met a delegation from Carno for an event at the Senedd yesterday, hosted by Montgomeryshire AM Mick Bates. They heard how the completion of the formal business case for the re-opening of Carno Station called for by the committee had been stalled by official inaction over the past year.

Chairman of the Carno Station Action Group, Tony Burton, said: "There was tremendous progress in the first year after we handed in the petition. The Enterprise and Learning Committee came to Carno to hold a hearing and concluded that a formal business case should be developed. The Deputy First Minister endorsed this and pointed to TraCC, the Mid Wales Transport Consortium, as the body to carry out the work. The WAG Head of Rail said they would look to see Carno as a priority within the 5 year Regional Transport Plan, and encouraged our group to contribute to the business case by providing evidence to TraCC. So we got busy and prepared a draft over the first six months of 2008, submitting it to TraCC on July 1st."

Since then, nothing has happened. TraCC have done no work to complete the formal document that the Enterprise and Learning Committee called for, citing lack of funding for consultants to assess and amend the Action Group's draft.

The Assembly Members present voiced their dismay at the failure to follow through on the Enterprise and Learning Committee's recommendation and determined to call upon the Deputy First Minister to get things moving again.

Notes:

Photo: Carno Station Action Group meet Assembly Members outside the Senedd

TraCC, or Trafnidiaeth Canolbarth Cymru, is a consortium of three local authorities, Powys, Ceredigion and South Gwynedd, which assists the Welsh Assembly Government in delivering its national integrated transport policies in the Mid Wales region.

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