The BMC Wales Access Officer (Elfyn Jones) has visited Tirpentwys with staff from Torfaen Council (who own the nature reserve) to discuss the situation there. The cliff face isn’t part of the nature reserve. The council are willing to enter into discussions with the owner of the cliff face about climbing access. However they have no funds or resource to put into this.

Elfyn has contacted the Llanover Estates, who state that they own the crag and not the local farmer. The Llanover Estates are happy to prove this if required as they have the title. The manager at the estates, said that he has been involved in discussion with the council regarding a formal access agreement for climbing at the site, but that the council had withdrawn from the discussions. The bolts were removed/damaged by contractors as the estate is worried about potential liability issues. They aren’t objecting to climbing at the site, just concerned about liability. Elfyn has asked them not to damage bolts further as they could make the routes unsafe for climbing, which would in his opinion increase the estates liability.

The good news is that the Estate have stated that they’re willing to enter negotiations to look at the possible options to allow climbing at this site.

Those options are varied and include :-

**BMC purchasing the site outright (highly unlikely as BMC policy is to avoid this in all but essential cases on nationally important sites) – apparently Torfaen council were discussing a price of less than £2000 I think, but it’s hard to put any value on such a site!

**A BMC formal lease (similar issues to above)

**A negotiated formal access agreement/licence with BMC somehow taking on the liability associated with climbing at the site.

**BMC brokering an agreement between the owner and Torfaen Council (again highly unlikely as they have budget constraints)

In order to get support for any of the above options this needs to be raised by the local area and brought to the attention of BMC National Council. This will then give Elfyn more support and a mandate for pursuing the various options stated above. Purchasing or leasing a climbing site is absolutely a last resort for the BMC and there appears to be very little support for such action from the BMC management at this time. However the BMC Peak and North West Areas have proven that this is not impossible in the past by lobbying the BMC to purchase Wilton/Craig y Longridge/Horseshoe, etc.

This drive needs to come from the local South Wales meetings and through local clubs. Without support and lobbying from the membership it will be very difficult to persuade the BMC’s management that this site is worthy of such intervention, as most of them won’t be aware of its existence or value!

The BMC will keep us updated with any developments.