CLLR. NISHANT CHANDOLIA SECURES HISTORIC WIN TO CLEAN UP ABERYSTWYTH’S RIVERS AND COAST – Cllr. Nishant Chandolia has secured a major victory for the Aberystwyth community, winning unanimous cross-party support for two landmark motions to tackle the “systematic pollution” of local waterways. The motions, proposed by Cllr. Chandolia at the full Town Council meeting on 27 April 2026, follow the release of shocking data showing that the river Ystwyth was subjected to 111 sewage dumps in the last year, totalling 1,126 hours. This is the equivalent of 47 days of continuous discharge into the river.

Cllr. Nishant Chandolia, representative for Central Ward on Aberystwyth Town Council, said: “Our identity as a town is inseparable from the Rheidol, the Ystwyth and Cardigan Bay. To see raw sewage released into our harbour an average of 1.6 times per week is a failure we can no longer ignore. I brought these motions forward because we need to move beyond words. This vote gives me a formal mandate to demand better for our residents and our local businesses.”

The successful motions commit the Council to a new “Source-to-Sea” accountability strategy, led by Cllr. Chandolia, which includes:

Public Accountability: formally calling Dŵr Cymru (Welsh Water) and Natural Resources Wales (NRW) to a public-facing meeting to explain their 2025–2030 investment plans.

Blocking Bad Development: as Aberystwyth Town Council is a statutory consultee for planning applications, it will recommend the refusal of any new buildings that don’t include modern drainage (SuDS), to reduce the strain on the town’s Victorian sewers.

Real-Time Transparency: demanding that Dŵr Cymru provide immediate, high-frequency public alerts every time a local overflow occurs.

Blue Health First: adopting “Motion for the Ocean” principles, ensuring the health of our waters is a top priority in every council decision.

Commenting on the regional crisis, Cllr. Chandolia added: “With Ceredigion recently ranked among the most polluted areas in the UK, we are drawing a line in the sand. While other local rivers like the Teifi make headlines for the wrong reasons, I am determined to ensure the Rheidol and Ystwyth are protected from similar degradation. This is a fight for the transparency and water quality that our community deserves.”

In addition to the policy changes, Cllr. Chandolia is also championing a “Stop the Block” community campaign to help residents and businesses reduce the fats and “unflushables” that contribute to 80% of local sewer blockages.

Nishant on Instagram, Facebook

by

Remember, we are volunteers who are not paid for our time in meetings or representing you, which takes up many hours of our spare time. We only do this because we love our town. The Town Council does have a small number of hard-working, paid staff. Please let us be clear that this site is not published or maintained by the Town Council or its staff but by a small group of individual councillors. The views expressed are those of the individual authors who post here.

Another thing we don’t intend to do here is to use this site for scoring party political points or electioneering. There are plenty of other places and opportunities for that. We believe in positive and constructive engagement with residents and with each other wherever we can, together with others from any progressive parties that look out for ordinary people.

This site is for letting you know what is happening in the town. We will try to be as factual as we can, although we can’t help giving you our opinions as we see things. You can hold us to account for it!

We are preparing some FAQs (forthcoming) for basic information about what we do – and what we don’t do – and remember that we are not the County Council! The Town Council doesn’t empty your bins and it doesn’t impose parking fees on you, for instance. It doesn’t repair the roads or run the schools or care homes. The County Council runs those big services. However, there is a great deal that we do for you, so we think it’s your right to know what. We intend to help inform the public about what the Town Council does and what its responsibilities are (pages forthcoming). In the meantime please check the Town Council’s web site.

While we are developing this site, please feel free to email us, the Town Council, or indeed any of your town councillors, if you have any questions about what we do or about specific issues. We have been elected to do our best to help you on local issues where we can.

The Welsh version of this web site is https://llaisaber.cymru

See the About Us page for more details.

by