A LOCAL described in court as “a fireworks enthusiast” has been sentenced by magistrates after letting off rockets in Haverfordwest town centre.

CCTV footage shown to Haverfordwest Magistrates’ Court this week captured Michael Glover, 58, walking into Castle Square on the night of Friday, November 8, before igniting around ten rockets close to a group of men.

Crown Prosecutor Dennis Davies told the court: “You can see from the men’s reaction that they felt this could have been a danger to them.”

The court heard the offence also breached a Community Order imposed by Swansea Crown Court in October 2025, after Glover was convicted of assaulting an emergency worker and causing criminal damage. It was also a breach of a conditional discharge imposed in July 2025.

Glover, of St Bridges View, Roch, pleaded guilty to discharging fireworks within fifty feet of the highway. He was represented by Tom Lloyd.

Mr Lloyd said: “This is a man who’s enthusiastic about fireworks. He had some left over from November 5 and decided to set them off in a place where this wasn’t allowed to happen. That’s as far as it goes.”

Glover was fined £80 and ordered to pay £85 in court costs and a £32 surcharge.

Critics say that questions over delivery remain

THE UK GOVERNMENT has unveiled a £15bn Warm Homes Plan, which ministers say will help upgrade millions of properties with measures such as insulation, solar panels, home batteries and heat pumps, cutting energy costs and tackling fuel poverty.

Downing Street claims the programme could lift up to one million households out of fuel poverty by 2030, describing it as the largest public investment in home upgrades in British history. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said: “A warm home shouldn’t be a privilege, it should be a basic guarantee,” while Energy Secretary Ed Miliband called it a “national project” to improve affordability and energy security.

What is being offered

Government statements set out three main strands:

Support for low-income households
Ministers say targeted funding will provide fully-funded upgrades for households in or at risk of fuel poverty, with packages tailored to the property – including measures such as insulation and rooftop solar.

An offer for other households
The plan also includes government-backed finance aimed at reducing the upfront cost of home energy technologies for homeowners who want to upgrade, alongside continued support for heat pumps.

New protections for renters and future standards for new homes
The Government says it will strengthen requirements to improve energy efficiency in rented homes over time and link the wider programme to the Future Homes Standard, expected to come in from early 2026, with an emphasis on building new homes that are cheaper to run.

What it could mean for Wales

Energy policy is set at Westminster, but the Government says the plan includes funding allocations for devolved nations, which could feed into programmes chosen by the Welsh Government. Existing support in Wales includes the Warm Homes Nest scheme, which provides upgrades for eligible households.

Rural parts of west Wales, including Pembrokeshire, contain many older and harder-to-heat properties, as well as off-gas homes where insulation and correctly specified systems can make the biggest difference. However, specialists have long warned that retrofitting older, solid-wall or stone properties often needs careful design to avoid problems such as damp and condensation.

Sceptical voices: targets, costs and capacity

While the announcement has been welcomed by campaigners who want faster action on cold and unhealthy housing, critics and analysts have raised concerns about whether the plan can be delivered at the scale promised.

National coverage notes that the Government has dropped plans for a future ban on new gas boilers, opting instead for incentives rather than regulation, and has set an ambition of around 450,000 heat pump installations per year by 2030 – a level some argue falls short of what would be needed to transform the market.

There are also questions over installer capacity, supply chains and quality control, after previous schemes faced criticism for inconsistency and uneven outcomes.

Next steps

Ministers say further detail will follow on eligibility, how households apply, and how support will be coordinated with devolved administrations. For families struggling with high bills, the key test will be whether the funding reaches the homes most in need quickly — and whether the measures offered work for the reality of Britain’s ageing housing stock, including rural communities in west Wales.

BUSINESS rates fears in west Wales reached the Senedd this week after Samuel Kurtz MS warned that hospitality and tourism firms could face “irreversible damage” unless ministers rethink the approach to the 2026 revaluation.

During First Minister’s Questions on Tuesday (Jan 20), the Conservative MS said he and Preseli Pembrokeshire MS Paul Davies would be hosting a business briefing for “over 100 businesses from across west Wales” who were “worried, frustrated and angry” about looming increases.

He told the Senedd one local hotel faced its rates bill rising from “£10,000 to £33,000” — an increase of “230 per cent” — and urged the First Minister to “change course on this immediately, before irreversible damage is done to the hospitality sector”.

The intervention is the clearest sign yet that concern over steep projected increases — particularly among hotels, pubs, restaurants and visitor attractions — is turning into an organised campaign, with businesses swapping draft figures and warning of closures and job losses if the biggest rises go ahead.

Responding, First Minister Eluned Morgan defended the Welsh Government’s record of support for the sector.

She said: “It is wrong to claim that we have not supported hospitality. We have spent over £1 billion since 2020 on business rate support for retail, leisure and hospitality.”

She added: “After April, at least half of pubs will get help with rates and a quarter will pay no rates at all.”

The First Minister also signalled that she could not commit to matching decisions made in England until the Welsh Government had full detail of what was being offered there and what funding consequentials might follow for Wales.

Pembrokeshire concerns fed into wider backlash

In Pembrokeshire, the issue first gained traction after county councillor Huw Murphy raised alarm about the scale of increases some firms were seeing in draft figures ahead of April 2026.

Since then, local businesses have reported proposed rises well into three figures in percentage terms — often in areas where footfall and seasonal trade are already fragile — with owners warning that higher overheads will squeeze budgets for staffing, maintenance and investment.

While some premises are expected to benefit from reductions, the sharpest increases appear concentrated in parts of the visitor economy, where rateable values can rise quickly in line with market evidence and local demand.

Mr Kurtz’s briefing is expected to focus on how the new figures are calculated, what scope there is for appeals, and what further relief—if any—might be needed for firms facing the largest jumps.

With attendance already said to be over 100, the meeting is also likely to act as a barometer of how far concern has spread across west Wales—and whether pressure will build on ministers to revisit support for hospitality, leisure and tourism businesses ahead of April.

For many firms, the rates issue is landing alongside wider cost pressures, with business groups warning that even a small number of forced closures could ripple outward—reducing local employment, weakening town centres and undermining the rural tourism offer.

What is the 2026 revaluation?

NON-domestic rates are calculated using a property’s “rateable value”, which is reassessed periodically in a revaluation.

The new values linked to the 2026 revaluation are due to take effect from April 2026, meaning some businesses will see bills rise while others fall.

If a business believes its valuation is inaccurate, it can challenge it through the Valuation Office Agency process, but firms are being urged to act early and gather evidence—such as comparable rents, trading impacts and property details—before formal deadlines.

Reliefs can also apply, including small business relief and sector-specific support, depending on the size and type of premises.