Author: Rhys Gregory

First Trenitalia, whose new Avanti West Coast rail service starts on Sunday 8 December, has today awarded a contract worth more than £350m to Hitachi Rail to provide and maintain 23 new intercity trains (135 carriages), to be built at its County Durham factory.  Bringing additional capacity to services along the West Coast Main Line and in North Wales, these new, state of the art intercity trains will start operating in 2022. The trains will be a mix of ten seven-carriage electric trains and 13 five-carriage bi-mode trains, with the ability to switch seamlessly between electric and diesel power. The…

A UNIQUE new partnership sees the USW Film & TV School Wales students and graduates working on leading television productions  The next generation of film-makers are being given the opportunity to work on leading television productions, thanks to a unique new partnership between the University of South Wales (USW) and Screen Alliance Wales (SAW) The three-year deal between Film & TV School Wales, based at USW’s Cardiff Campus, and SAW, will strengthen a relationship that has already seen USW students and graduates working on major TV productions, including the hit drama series His Dark Materials. Working as trainees in Cardiff’s Wolf Studios,…

Managed by Swansea Council, the market is the permanent home to more than 100 businesses, hosts casual traders, puts on regular events and attracts around 80,000 shoppers every week. It has made the top 10 in the favourite market category of the 2020 Great British Market Awards. No other Welsh locations are in the running. Council city centre manager Lisa Wells said: “The public have been voting in this competition run by the National Association of British Market Authorities (NABMA) – and we’re delighted that Swansea Market is doing so well. “The association tells us that voting was very competitive so…

Pride, I Am Not a Witch, Dark Horse, Eternal Beauty, Gwen, Submarine, Journey’s End, The Lighthouse and Queerama are some of the most recent critically acclaimed and well-known films either produced by Welsh talent or filmed in Wales – all of which have been backed by National Lottery funding through the BFI and/or Ffilm Cymru Wales.   However, some of the most watched films in Wales are not mainstream blockbusters, they don’t feature BAFTA winning actors nor do they feature rousing music. They are a vast range of documentaries, home movies, news footage, forgotten TV programmes and government films from throughout…

CHILDREN from a north Wales school took part in a traditional story-sharing afternoon with the Archdruid of Wales Myrddin ap Dafydd and a group of local former quarrymen, as part of a special launch event for World Book Day 2020. The group of Year 6 pupils from Ysgol Gwaun Gynfi in Deiniolen joined the writer and publisher on Monday, 2 December, for a fireside reading from his new book Stori Cymru – Iaith a Gwaith at the National Slate Museum in Llanberis. The book is the first of the £1 World Book Day 2020 Welsh-language books to be announced and…

Blind and partially sighted voters must be able to cast their ballot papers in secret, says a campaigner for a leading sight loss charity as it launches its manifesto for the General Election on December 12th. Dan Thomas, 32, from Cardiff, says that existing voting arrangements do not consider the many diverse needs of blind and partially sighted people across Wales. Dan has been blind since birth and works with RNIB Cymru as a volunteer and campaigner. The two voting aids currently available to blind and partially sighted people, a large-print ballot paper or a tactile voting device, a plastic…

INDEPENDENT homebuilder the Edenstone Group predicts an annual turnover of £80 million by 2020-2021. The Magor-based business, ranked at number seven in the Fast Growth 50 guide, has achieved record results. Turnover and the number of private sale completions both doubled in the last year. Operating across South Wales and the South West of England, the company credits diversification for its continued success. During the year, the Group launched its Bluebell Homes brand and the new Ashgrove Partnerships business, which works with registered social landlords and local authorities to deliver affordable housing. Martin Taylor, managing director of the Edenstone Group,…

Company bosses in Wrexham are being urged to reduce their use of packaging and plastic waste in the war against climate change. The plea came from Wrexham AM Lesley Griffiths, who is also the Welsh Government Minister for the Environment, Energy and Rural Affairs, at the annual dinner of Wrexham Business Professionals. The group is made up of successful businesses and highly skilled professionals working together to promote regional prosperity and the enterprise and expertise that exists in the region. Ms Griffiths told the packed Ramada Hotel function room that we only have a short period of time in which to…

Business confidence in Wales is at its lowest level than at any time in the last ten years, a new report published today by chartered accountancy body ICAEW has found.  And confidence among businesses in Wales is also lower than the UK as a whole, ICAEW’s Business Confidence Monitor™ report for Wales, published today (Thursday) shows. Ongoing Brexit uncertainty is likely to be a key factor dampening business sentiment in Wales. Other concerns for Welsh businesses include customer demand, which 41% of companies say is a growing issue. Businesses are also having problems with late payments, with 30% reporting them…

As the threat of cybercrime increases, two of Wales’ brightest tech companies have joined forces to help protect businesses across Wales. Swansea based IT support company Pisys.net have partnered with Newport consultancy Wolfberry Cyber Security to offer mid to large-sized businesses a simple solution to the fight against cybercrime. Wolfberry, an ethical hacking company, has offices in London and Dubai and helps organisations identify and manage cyber risks across a variety of sectors and are the recent winners of the South Wales Tech business of the year at the South Wales Argus awards. “Cybercriminals are actively targeting businesses of all…