Natural Resources Wales (NRW) has issued a Flood Alert for the Pembrokeshire coastfollowing rising water levels. The alert, which affects areas between St Dogmaels, Cardigan and Amroth, warns that flooding is possible in the region due to adverse weather conditions and high tides.

The alert was issued at 12:53 PM today (Apr 4), urging local residents to be prepared for potential flooding in the coming hours.

Key Advice for Residents

As the flood risk increases, NRW has shared crucial advice to help people stay safe:

• Prepare a flood plan: If you have one, now is the time to follow it.
• Protect valuables: Residents should move important items, such as documents and sentimental belongings, to higher ground or safer locations.
• Stay alert and pack an emergency kit: Ensure your phone is charged, and pack essential items like medications, chargers, insurance documents, and warm clothing in case you need to evacuate quickly.
• Check on vulnerable individuals: Ensure that children, elderly relatives, and pets are safe, with a plan for their evacuation if necessary.

Avoid Floodwater at All Costs

NRW is also stressing the importance of avoiding floodwater, as even shallow levels of water can be extremely dangerous. As little as 30 cm (1 foot) of floodwater can sweep away a car, and 15 cm (6 inches) can knock you off your feet.

Authorities are urging everyone to never walk or drive through flooded areas.

How to Stay Updated

Residents are advised to stay informed through NRW’s website, where they can track water levels and access real-time updates. The agency also recommends checking its social media accounts for the latest information.

For more detailed information or if you need assistance, call Floodline at 0345 988 1188 (quick dial number: 503013).

For More Information:

• Flood Warning Details: Flood Warning Page
• Check River and Rainfall Levels: River Levels
• Floodline: 0345 988 1188

Follow NRW on Twitter: @NatResWales

Image: Herald file photo

THE WELSH GOVERNMENT’s key Child Poverty Strategy lacks clarity, has no reliable way of measuring success or failure, and, crucially, does not account for the Welsh Government’s lack of control over the levers needed to deliver on it.

Those are the findings of a new report by the UK’s leading economic policy research body, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), which looks at Wales’s economic performance and poor employment record.

The IFS report, published on Wednesday (April 1), shows that Wales’s economic performance is the worst of the UK nations, with the lowest employment rate, the lowest incomes, the lowest productivity, and the worst poverty levels.

POVERTY STRATEGY LACKS FOCUS

The Welsh Government launched its Child Poverty Strategy in 2018, with five broad aims to reduce child and youth poverty. However, the IFS criticises how those aims have been set out, finding that the definitions are too broad to be measured accurately and lack focus. In particular, the IFS says the strategy’s aims are so nebulous that they ignore the impact of policy areas over which the Welsh Government exercises direct control, for example, health and education, on how outcomes might be measured.

The IFS report says: “Issues with the data mean a material risk that the Welsh Government might either appear to have met a future poverty target or missed it, by a large margin, when in fact the reverse is true.”

WG NOT IN CONTROL OF OWN POVERTY STRATEGY

In any event, several of the most direct policy levers available to influence employment and earnings, including minimum wages, employment law and benefits policy, are reserved to Westminster. However, even if these policy levers were available, it would be very challenging to achieve large, rapid reductions in child poverty with them. In addition, Labour has ruled out using the tax system to generate additional income to help it meet its aims.

Wales’s highest-earning regions are along the North East Wales border with England and in the Cardiff and Newport areas. In addition, proportionately more Welsh employees are public sector workers, who are also, far and away, the best paid in Wales. The average public sector wage is around £5,000 higher than the average private sector wage. And those jobs, too, are disproportionately centred in Cardiff, Newport and North East Wales. The best-performing areas by employment rate, Monmouthshire and Newport, are within easy reach of the English border.

POVERTY CONCEALED BY LOWER PROPERTY VALUES

Compared with the rest of the UK, the gap between men’s and women’s pay is lower in Wales, as are the differences in income and in the highest and lowest property prices. However, property prices are far lower in Wales than in England, as are incomes overall; in addition, there are so few higher-rate tax earners in Wales that the Welsh Government increasing their income tax would have a negligible effect on its revenue. In addition, because Welsh housing prices are much lower than elsewhere in the UK, and because housing costs are a factor in how poverty is measured, housing costs improve one of the key poverty metrics.

TV presenter and commentator to appear at Cardiff event aimed at mobilising anti-Reform voters before May 7

CAROL VODERMAN has urged voters in Wales to reject Reform UK at next month’s Senedd election, as she prepares to appear at a live political event in Cardiff focused on keeping the party out of power.

Speaking ahead of an emergency Guilty Feminist Welsh Election Special at the New Theatre, Cardiff, on Sunday, April 12, Vorderman said Wales faced a crucial choice at the ballot box.

She said: “Wales has a chance for a new beginning in May. But Reform, the chaotic London-based, privately educated, failed Tory party, needs to be sent packing.

“Already numerous of their 96 Welsh candidates have resigned or been sacked for revolting actions. Their last Welsh Reform leader Nathan Gill is serving time in jail for accepting Russian bribes while serving in the European Parliament. Their new Welsh leader was a Tory living in London until a few months ago.

“Farage is a thin-skinned and proven liar. Everyone must come out to vote to save our country. Cymru Am Byth.”

Vorderman is due to appear alongside Guilty Feminist host Deborah Frances-White, with Welsh comedians Kiri Pritchard-McLean and Priya Hall also on the bill. Organisers say the night will mix comedy, music and political discussion, with the aim of building strategy ahead of the election.

Frances-White said polling suggested the Senedd result could be close and argued that “it really matters who ends up making decisions about our lives”, adding that the event was intended as a “get-in-the-room” night to work out how to respond.

Reform UK’s current leader in Wales is Dan Thomas, who was unveiled by Nigel Farage in Newport in February. Thomas is a former Conservative leader of Barnet Council in London, although he grew up in Blackwood.

Vorderman’s reference to Nathan Gill points to a highly embarrassing chapter in the party’s recent history. Gill, a former Reform UK politician and ex-MEP, was jailed last year after admitting taking bribes from pro-Russian figures in exchange for speeches and statements in the European Parliament.

Asked for a response to Vorderman’s remarks, a Reform UK Wales source replied briefly: “Does she even live in Wales?”

It was a short answer, but perhaps not one likely to end the argument. With the campaign heating up, and with high-profile voices now piling in from outside formal party politics, the battle for attention ahead of May 7 is only getting louder.