South Wales Evening Post - 8 May 2007
Senior Swansea councillors and officers are to hold a behind-closed-doors meeting to discuss the controversial Fflam festival.
Opposition to the three-day music festival has been growing and hundreds of people have signed a petition calling for it to be scrapped. Big-name bands, including the Manic Street Preachers and Keane have been signed up for the Singleton Park show.
However, residents living near the park fear the 30,000 fans expected for the concert will make their lives a misery.
Now cabinet members and heads of department at Swansea Council are set for high-level discussions.
A leaked memo to senior councillors and the council's corporate management team says: "A special corporate briefing will be held to discuss the Fflam festival."
The unscheduled meeting is a sign of growing unrest, according to one Swansea Council insider.
The councillor, who does not want to be named added: "Corporate briefings are joint meetings between the cabinet and chief officers. A special meeting must mean that there are mounting worries about the festival."
He said the administration was likely to be coming under pressure from its own councillors following some opposition to the event.
He said: "These briefings are not very common. They are usually only held for big projects.
"Considering the plans for the festival are supposedly all done and dusted apart from a few small things with the organisers, it seems strange to be holding this sort of meeting now. The only thing I can imagine is that Uplands and Sketty ward councillors are putting pressure on the cabinet."
The festival is described as Wales's first major music festival" and is set to take place on July 13,14 and 15.
Swansea Council leader Chris Holley said: "This corporate briefing is just to bring us up to date with where we are. Obviously, there has been a lot of reaction from the public and councillors in the area around Singleton Park, but there are people on both sides of the argument.
"I think a lot of the opposition is down to the type of music. But there are also people who say that it is a great idea.
"This meeting is really about understanding exactly where we are in the process."
