The second county council by-election of the term will be held in the Pyle, Kenfig Hill and Cefn Cribwr ward next Thursday (1st May 2025).
It’s to fill the vacancy left on Bridgend County Borough Council following the resignation of Labour’s Mike Kearn as county councillor in March.
Pyle, Kenfig Hill & Cefn Cribwr: Ward Profile
The Pyle, Kenfig Hill and Cefn Cribwr ward was created for the 2022 local elections by merging the former Pyle and Cefn Cribwr wards. By population, it’s the sixth largest ward in Bridgend County with around 8,800 residents as of 2021.
The ward is broadly divided into “urban” and “rural” areas.
The villages of Kenfig Hill and Pyle are part of the same urban area (alongside North Cornelly). Without signs, you would find it difficult to tell if you’ve passed through one into the other.
Cefn Cribwr is a smaller hilltop village to the east surrounded by farmland, with the even smaller village/hamlets of Cefn Cross, Cwm Ffoes and Fforddygyfraith alongside it.
Most local facilities are in Pyle. Village Farm Industrial Estate in Pyle is one of the county’s larger employment areas.
Compared to Junctions 35 (Pencoed) and 36 (Sarn) of the M4, Junction 37 is underdeveloped – though there have been on-off plans to change this. Land to the immediate south of the railway has been set aside in the Local Development Plan for up to 2,000 homes, so a big population increase should be expected over the coming decades.
10.8% of people in the ward aged 3+ said they could read, speak and write Welsh at the 2021 census – slightly lower than the Bridgend county average (11.7%).
The Issues
As with everywhere else, general county-wide issues have been raised during the election campaign. Some recent decisions by Bridgend Council have proven unpopular. If you want an example (anecdotally) many people have been caught off guard by BCBC’s decision to stop providing blue household waste bags. Little things like that tend to annoy people more than you would think.
There have been traffic issues in and around Village Farm Industrial Estate – especially since the opening of the new recycling centre.
The ruling Labour administration can point to extra investment in local schools, notably a new Mynydd Cynffig Primary School (which has faced years of delays) and the expansion of Welsh-medium education at the new Ysgol Y Ferch O’r Sger.
The loss of allotments as part of the Mynydd Cynffig development has been controversial, even if they’re set to be replaced before any work starts on the new school itself.
There will be question marks over whether local services can cope with the additional 2,000 homes set to be built in the area under the LDP.
The area has a history of quarrying and opencast mining. The former Parc Slip/Margam opencast mine on the outskirts of Kenfig Hill filled with water over several years, creating a “lake”. Although an overflow channel into the River Kenfig was installed several years ago, the site has never been properly restored.
Similar situations elsewhere – notably Ffos-y-Fran in Merthyr Tydfil – have brought a bit more attention once more to what’s happened at Parc Slip/Margam and the failure of the authorities to enforce opencast mine restoration.
There are early proposals for a wind farm north of Cefn Cribwr and Kenfig Hill too.
Candidates & Outlook
There are six candidates, in alphabetical order by surname:
- Gary Chappell (Lab)
- Owain Clatworthy (Reform)
- Debra Cooper (Green)
- Byron Davies (Con)
- Andy Moss (Plaid)
- Rhys Watkins (Ind)
Even though the ward is only three years old, the former Pyle and Cefn Cribwr wards were safe Labour seats. Labour won all three seats in the new ward at the 2022 local elections too.
The only time anyone other than Labour won a county council seat was when Plaid Cymru’s Kevin Burnell won the Cefn Cribwr ward in 1999.
So on paper, Labour should win this by-election. Their closest challenger will likely be the Independent candidate (backed by the Bridgend County Independents group) – and former Plaid Cymru UK parliament candidate – Rhys Watkins.
Anyone other than Gary Chappell or Rhys Watkins (who are both sitting Pyle community councillors) winning the seat would go down as a shock result. Though this is an area you would expect Reform to want to perform well in too – they should be looking at challenging for third place (at least).
Either way, for all of the candidates and parties it’s a useful exercise to see where they are ahead of next year’s Senedd elections. The new electoral system – whereby all MSs will be elected by proportional representation – means that vote share will matter more than the number of votes.
That’s particularly important for Reform and Plaid Cymru as they will be strongly challenging to win two seats each in the Senedd’s new Afan Ogwr Rhondda constituency (which includes Pyle and Kenfig Hill) alongside Labour. Cefn Cribwr will be in the new Penybont Bro Morgannwg constituency.
