Campaigner to walk ‘distance to Cardiff’ to highlight lack of mandatory Welsh history on new curriculum

A man who is campaigning for the inclusion of Welsh history on the country’s curriculum has said he will walk the distance to Cardiff on his farm track to draw attention to the issue.

Elfed Wyn Jones had planned to walk from Trawsfynydd in the north of Wales to the capital until the latest Covid-19 ‘fire break’ lockdown scuppered his plans.

As a result of the new restrictions, he will walk the same 128-mile distance on the track of his farm in Cwm Prysor, Trawsfynydd.

His petition, signed by over 7,000 people, calling for Welsh history to be included as a set part of the new Welsh curriculum will be discussed in the Senedd on Tuesday, the 3rd of November.

There is currently nothing in the new Welsh curriculum to stipulate that any Welsh history, beyond local history, must be taught at all.

Elfed Wyn Jones said that the road on his farm is a quarter-mile long, so he would need to walk from the farmhouse to the main road, and back 512 times to reach that distance.

He said that the current curriculum as devised would bring about a “lottery-style system” where the teaching of Welsh history would depend on which schools the pupil would attend, the language the pupil would be speaking and the preferences of the teachers.

He added that if not successful next week he would be willing to go on a hunger strike to make sure that “everybody gets the right to understand and develop from the past”.