"Howard Neil" hneil@REMOVE TO REPLY.co.uk wrote in message
...

"David Hill" wrote in message
...
"..........One small point, Middleton is in west Wales, not
south........."

Or shall we say South West Wales

--
David Hill
Abacus nurseries
www.abacus-nurseries.co.uk

Geographically, you are correct. Goodness knows why it is called west
Wales
when there are places further west (and up a bit) that are mid Wales.

Probably for the same reason as West Yorkshire is East of where I live in
North Yorkshire

Franz

In article , David Hill david@abacusn
urseries.freeserve.co.uk writes
They have had a lot of funding including an additional 1/4 of a Million
pounds from the Welsh assembly, and now a further 1/4 million Half from the
local council and the other half from The Welsh assembly again.
This is on top of all the grants (Lottery etc) to get them set up in the
first instance.

I missed this thread a month ago when it came around, so apologies for
joining so late.....

But there was an announcement today that the gardens had accepted an
offer of a (relatively) small amount of funding to keep it going (for a
while at least)

I don't know all the facts, but I'm under the impression that other
botanic gardens in this country receive massive funding on an annual
basis from the government. I don't think the NBGOW money comes anywhere
close so 'a lot of funding' is perhaps not correct in this context.

I'm fortunate in living only about ten minutes drive away and I've been
three or four times this year. I knew it was going to be a long term
project (as is any garden) but I've been very pleasantly surprised as to
how much work they've done and how well things have come on in the last
two years. (And its so annoying that the TV news pictures are archived
and show it as it WAS when it was first opened!!)

Its a very nice day out now. In years to come its going to be
tremendous. Even if it can't self-fund itself, I just can't understand
why the government isn't stepping in to keep it going on a permanent
basis.
Must be some political reasoning I'm not aware of methinks!

--
__________________________________________
Gareth Jones

"Reality sucks - go watch a Star Trek"

To email, remove the '_ns_' from

__________________________________________

You might find this of interest

Grant gives Wales' botanic garden new lease of life

David Ward
Tuesday October 7, 2003
The Guardian

A £43m Welsh lottery project that looked as if it might go the same way as
the Millennium Dome was thrown a cash lifeline last night.
The trustees of Middleton, the national botanic garden of Wales which boasts
Britain's largest single-span greenhouse, announced that they had accepted a
£353,000 emer agency package which would enable the garden to stay open "in
the short term".

But Middleton's future is uncertain as it searches for new funding, and
redundancies among the 100 staff seem inevitable. The garden, opened in
2000, aimed to attract 250,000 visitors a year to its 226-hectare (568-acre)
site at Middleton Hall in Carmarthenshire.

But the project, with a serious research brief, failed to achieve the
success of the Eden Project in Cornwall. The number of visitors paying the
£6.95 admission charge dropped to 150,000, prompting a cash crisis, which
threatened jobs. Last week the trustees appealed to the Welsh assembly when
it seemed as if the garden, which received £21.6m from the Millennium
Commission, could go into administration.

The assembly came up with a financial offer, which would have kept Middleton
open for just one month. The trustees said the strings attached to the deal
were unacceptable.

But just before the weekend, they were offered a new deal put together by
Carmarthen county council, the assembly and the Millennium Commission.

The council and the assembly offered £150,000 each and the commission has
contributed £53,000.

"During this period of financial respite, the Welsh assembly government will
lead the search to find a funding partner for Middleton," said a statement
from the trustees.

"The garden will remain open, but to maximise available funds, it will be
operated with a skeleton staff. All staff contracts will be honoured, with
appropriate redundancy pack ages being put in place."

At the weekend, the trustees offered free entry to Middleton and all records
were broken when 4,500 visitors arrived.

Evelyn Thurlby, Middleton's chief operating officer said: "Visitors'
comments underlined just how important having a national botanic garden is
for Wales."

Middleton is the first national botanic garden created in Britain for 200
years.


--
David Hill
Abacus nurseries
www.abacus-nurseries.co.uk

The last funding, wit almost all staff sacked and around 200 volunteers
looking after the grounds will only keep the place afloat till just before
Xmas.
Several botanic gardens are funded from the public purse,and most of these
have No admission charge.
The funding would come from the Welsh Assembly, not from Westminster, and
there are not many in Wales who would see a payment of several Millions of
pounds a year for a garden that is still charging a hefty admission fee to
be a good way of spending a limited budget.
There is no way that Carmarthen council will fund the gardens when they
wouldn't even put up the £30,000 needed to keep Llanelli flower show
going( and this was one of the best shows in Wales).
Sorry, but unless outside money can be found then it's curtains for
Middleton as it now is.

--
David Hill
Abacus nurseries
www.abacus-nurseries.co.uk

"Gareth Jones" wrote in message
...
SNIP:
: Its a very nice day out now. In years to come its going to be
: tremendous. Even if it can't self-fund itself, I just can't understand
: why the government isn't stepping in to keep it going on a permanent
: basis.
: Must be some political reasoning I'm not aware of methinks!
:
: --
: __________________________________________
: Gareth Jones
:
Possibly because they feel that the welsh can't have it both ways ie
nationalism when it suits them, or because they feel there are more
important things to spend money on ie health, education, social services
etc.

I'm not a political animal so I am not advocating the rights or wrongs of
this argument, just suggesting a possible reason..

K

On Mon, 3 Nov 2003 23:15:25 -0000, "David Hill"
wrote:

The last funding, wit almost all staff sacked and around 200 volunteers
looking after the grounds will only keep the place afloat till just before
Xmas.
Several botanic gardens are funded from the public purse,and most of these
have No admission charge.
The funding would come from the Welsh Assembly, not from Westminster, and
there are not many in Wales who would see a payment of several Millions of
pounds a year for a garden that is still charging a hefty admission fee to
be a good way of spending a limited budget.
There is no way that Carmarthen council will fund the gardens when they
wouldn't even put up the £30,000 needed to keep Llanelli flower show
going( and this was one of the best shows in Wales).
Sorry, but unless outside money can be found then it's curtains for
Middleton as it now is.

In the last few days I saw a brief item in the Daily telegraph saying
that some sort of deal has been done to get Tim Smit to help a plan
together. sorry, I don't have a reference to it.

Regards, VivienB

"K" wrote in message ...
"Gareth Jones" wrote in message
...
SNIP:
: Its a very nice day out now. In years to come its going to be
: tremendous. Even if it can't self-fund itself, I just can't understand
: why the government isn't stepping in to keep it going on a permanent
: basis.
: Must be some political reasoning I'm not aware of methinks!
:
: --
: __________________________________________
: Gareth Jones
:
Possibly because they feel that the welsh can't have it both ways ie
nationalism when it suits them, or because they feel there are more
important things to spend money on ie health, education, social services
etc.

I'm not a political animal so I am not advocating the rights or wrongs of
this argument, just suggesting a possible reason..

K

Why is Eden in Cornwall a success? Because its sold to people via
advertising and "free" features on the telly. Its certainly no cheaper
to get in to.
This was brought home to me a couple of weeks ago when I saw a tourist
ad for Scotland followed back to back by a Welsh tourist ad. You've
probably all seen them.
The Scots one sold a concept of Scotland, all heather, mountains, warm
cosy log fires and romance.
The Welsh one ran along the lines of "Come to Wales, its jolly nice" I
know which one attracted me and I live in Wales.
Until the Welsh tourist board gets its act together the NBCW and most
other Welsh attractions are never going to succeed. Im not suprised
its failing, how many times have you seen it featured on TV?

Mark

On 4 Nov 2003 06:02:14 -0800, (Mark Fawcett)
wrote:

Why is Eden in Cornwall a success? Because its sold to people via
advertising and "free" features on the telly. Its certainly no cheaper
to get in to.
This was brought home to me a couple of weeks ago when I saw a tourist
ad for Scotland followed back to back by a Welsh tourist ad. You've
probably all seen them.

Come and enjoy a wonderful holiday in glorious Cornwall, see The Eden
Project while you're there.

or

Come and see our garden (it's in Wales, by the way)


Which did I go for? and where will I return?

--
®óñ© © ²°°³

The national assembly said today that a close watch is being kept on several
private bidders who are interested in forming a partnership with the botanic
Gardens, but they don't want to loose the Millennium funding that is still
coming in.

--
David Hill
Abacus nurseries
www.abacus-nurseries.co.uk