2000 Light Years from Home

I am sitting in Knighton approximately 80 miles from home. The fastest way to get here is by car (unless you have a fast motorbike and have a primal need to meet your maker). In 2013, this can’t be done in less than two hours. Although it would have taken marginally longer by horse and cart many years ago, our ancestors were arguably far more advanced.

Wales has boasted a National Assembly for a number of years now on the back of a majority thinner than an After Eight mint. That it pertains to be an independent nation is laughable. If you live in Powys where I sit today, you are heavily outnumbered by sheep because there are only about 120,000 people in the entire county. The reason that Wales is so badly joined up is that, in effect, it only has two roads. In the South of the country, the M4 connects the three biggest cities (Newport, Cardiff and Swansea). In the North, the coast is served by the A55 dual carriageway. The two lanes of the latter have to support an army of caravans, cars and motorhomes making their way from the English cities of Liverpool and Manchester to the sprinkling of resorts which pepper the North Wales coast from Prestatyn in the East to Anglesey in the West.

The problem begins in earnest when you have a need to travel from the North to the South. Here the true measure of Welsh independence is to be found. The neglect of the middle bit (Mid Wales) has gone on for years. This is well illustrated by the fact that people needing a hospital in the North have three to choose from along the course of the A55. Those in the South have options in all the three main cities not to mention those in Merthyr Tydfil and other places. People living in the middle bit have to go to England for a hospital (Shrewsbury or Hereford). 

It is therefore baffling to see that while £10 million is being spent on improving the railway line between Wrexham and Shrewsbury, not a penny is being considered to link up the North with the South by road or even, heaven forbid, to begin a fund to build a District General Hospital for Mid Wales. With each and every decision they make, the Welsh Assembly are actually dividing Wales more and more in to two poles with the bit in the middle becoming progressively more reliant upon England.

In a way, it is ironic that a place like Knighton in Mid Wales was the scene of one of the most famous victories of the Welshmen seen by many to be the inspiration for the cause of Welsh Nationalism. Owain Glyndwr, the last Prince of Wales, hailed from the heartlands of Mid Wales and achieved countless victories over the English with very limited resources. If he were alive today, he would be at best confused by the machinations of the current Assembly. Perhaps Wales and England were both better off when their community spirit was so great they didn’t warrant great road connections between them.

In 2010, I was despatched to Ludlow for 4 weeks for a work placement in General Practice. I have clearly been rewarded for my exemplary commitment by now being flown in to Knighton. I’m just glad my medical school don’t have any affiliations to the Outer Hebrides otherwise I’d be in real trouble!