6. Will the First Minister make a statement on historical Welsh place names? OAQ(5)0249(FM)

Our historic place names provide invaluable evidence about the development of our nation. It is one of the requirements of the Historic Environment (Wales) Act 2016 that Welsh Ministers create a list of historic place names that will then record this rich heritage for the future.

Thank you very much for that response, First Minister. It’s been noted, as you’ve noted, over the past few years that there are a number of examples of historic place names on old houses, halls and farms. These historic Welsh names have all come under threat and very often some are changed to English names. Do you as a Government agree that there is potential to develop legislation where a local planning authority’s permission will be required before changing historic Welsh place names?

That’s something that we have considered, but when we looked at it—there are more names changed from English to Welsh than from Welsh to English. As a result, in what way, therefore, would it be possible to police this through the planning regime? I’m not in favour of changing Welsh names to English names—place names, that is. Having said that, the Welsh Language Commissioner has established a panel to provide her with advice and recommendations about the way in which we can ensure that our heritage in the Welsh language is safeguarded.

First Minister, it is important that historic Welsh place names are safeguarded so that people understand their local history better, and it also helps to keep that history alive. In order to help in safeguarding historic place names, in addition to publishing a list, what guidance has your Government published to date?

Paul Davies is, of course, talking about what I mentioned earlier about the work of the commissioner, which is something I welcome. As someone who lives in a town where there are huge problems with some streets because of the fact that the names of the streets have been Welsh for decades, then they’ve been translated very poorly into English and nobody now knows where they live. There are several examples in Bridgend where the Welsh names for roads have been misspelled or have been misinterpreted and mistranslated too. So, nobody knows where they are now. So, it is important because there are some people who can’t receive credit as a result of that, and the sat navs don’t work either. But it shows how important this issue is to ensure that we have one name in the Welsh language that is considered as the official name, where that names has been a historic name over the decades and centuries.