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Storm Lilian-damaged Conwy Harbour requires £500k for repairs

Conwy County Council HQ

ASKING a cash-strapped local authority to stump up the £500,000 needed to repair a Storm Lilian damaged harbour may be a “futile gesture”. Councillors on Conwy County Council harbour advisory committee fear the repair funds won’t be forthcoming but they agreed to do so on the basis that “if you don’t ask you don’t get”.

The committee heard how the August storm caused tens of thousands of pounds worth of damage to pontoons and infrastructure to Conwy’s harbour in August. Winds ripped through Conwy even before the storm landed during the busy summer season when the harbour was packed with boats, and several sections of pontoons were sunk. Pontoons are the floating platforms providing access to boats.

Conwy’s harbour master Matt Forbes said he felt it was unlikely that the council would pay for the damage. “The pontoons cost about £20,000 each to replace. We’ve been doing so for the last seven years. We’ve been using the revenue budget to fund the purchase of one or two per year,” he said.

“Given the state of the local authority’s budget, it is very unlikely that there would be any capital funding to replace the pontoons in their entirety. We are probably talking about half a million pounds if we were to do that, and that would be doing it on the cheap. So I think we are where we are with this.

“I think we have to be realistic. If public toilets are being closed, Conwy Council is not suddenly going to give the harbour half a million pounds. So what we’ll have to keep doing is picking the worst pontoons each year and hoping that we can have enough in the revenue budget to fund the purchase of one.”

He added: “We do have a reserve, which we’re trying to hold on to because we are concerned that we may end up needing to replace the crane on the barge at some point, and we’re probably looking at about £100,000 to do that, so that’s why we’re very reluctant to use reserves for anything else apart from that.”

Committee member and cabinet member for infrastructure, transport and facilities, Cllr Goronwy Edwards agreed any request for additional funds was unlikely to be successful. But Cllr Edwards said the committee should still submit a request.

Committee chair Joan Vaughan said: “If you don’t ask, you don’t get.” The committee then discussed increasing mooring charges but said it didn’t want to risk reducing the number of boats at the harbour.

The committee then voted in favour of requesting the repair funds. Committee member Bryn Hughes likened the request to turkeys voting for Christmas.

“I’m not not in favour of it,” he said. “We know it’s a futile gesture, telling the cabinet that we need to replace these things, and we want upwards of half a million pounds to sort it out.

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“There’s no way anybody’s going to vote for… (giving the harbour master half a million pound). It’s like turkeys voting for Christmas. If we put in something like that, we all know it’s not going to happen.”

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