Referendum roadtrip (1)
Charles Hopkinson's family has lived at Bigsweir House for almost six hundred years.
His great grandfather used to put his horse on the train at the local station and catch a train up the Wye Valley for a day's hunting.
These days the station (known variously as Bigsweir, St Briavels or Llandogo Halt) is long gone, as is the hunting.
Mr Hopkinson makes a living through the farming, forestry and fishing interests of the Bigsweir Estate, interests that straddle the border.
That means dealing with Cadw on the Welsh side of the River Wye, English Heritage on the other - ditto for different parts of the Environment Agency.
He may live in England, but devolution has changed his life - he says he's noticed "a sort of wall going up between the two countries that wasn't there before".
He admits occasional frustration: "When you apply for the grant you can go through various stages and it goes to the final assessment and then you're turned down for a grant in Wales because your postal address in England".
Chepstow is closer to England than it is to Cardiff, but the local Tesco has a "Welsh-first" language policy on its signs.
Tim Melville, co-ordinator of the "Transition Chepstow" group, is an enthusiast for the Welsh assembly's law-making powers, particularly its introduction later this year of a 5 pence charge for plastic bags in shops.
Mr Melville has helped distribute 7,000 organic "bags for life" in the town as part of a drive towards sustainability.
"I think it is great that the Welsh Assembly are showing initiative and leadership in that respect," he told me. "I hope they go on to do other things, perhaps in planning."
He believes that people have begun to realise the Welsh assembly can make a difference through policies such as the charge for bags and free prescriptions.
I stopped off at St Briavels and Chepstow during a roadtrip along the border, a journey designed to assess the impact of devolution past, present and future ahead of Thursday's referendum.
Whether you see devolution as a wall or not, there's no doubt that differences between Wales and England have grown.
A lot of the focus during the referendum campaign has been on the assembly's law-making powers but one of the reasons why the two countries are diverging has been the different policies applied by UK governments, past and present, in England.
Labour under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, and the current coalition under David Cameron and Nick Clegg, have all run public services rather differently from Labour and Plaid Cymru in Wales.
You too can meet Charles Hopkinson and Tim Melville and follow my journey through border country on Wales Today at 1830 this evening. The reports should also be available online.
Hello. I'm David Cornock and I'm parliamentary correspondent for Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Wales. This is the blog for the latest news and gossip from the Westminster village - with a Welsh accent.
Comments
or to comment.