2012 in Wales


This article is about the particular significance of the year 2012 to Wales and its people.

Incumbents

January

  • 1 January – Welsh recipients of New Year Honours include musician Walford Hutchings, rugby player Martyn Williams and politician Alex Carlile.
  • 12 January – Controversial proposals for a new school "banding" system are unveiled by Assembly minister Leighton Andrews.
  • 19 January – 249 staff at the Cardiff HQ of Peacocks are made redundant as the company goes into administration.
  • 27 January – It is revealed that the missing documents which caused the collapse of the Lynette White police corruption trial in November 2011 have been found.
  • 30 January – The inquest into the death of former Wales football manager Gary Speed returns a "narrative verdict".

    February

  • 9 February – All Wales Ethnic Minority Association—a Swansea-based charity whose role was to distribute funds to ethnic minority projects across Wales—loses all National Assembly funding after a damning report identified "fundamental failures in the control and governance" within the charity.
  • 29 February – Plaid Cymru MP Elfyn Llwyd calls for England to pay a financial charge for receiving water from Wales.

    March

  • 1 March – As part of Saint David's Day celebrations, the Welsh Assembly announces that the home of poet Hedd Wyn has been secured for the nation by the Snowdonia National Park Authority.
  • 12 March – Roath Lock, the new BBC Wales television production studio in Cardiff Bay, is officially opened.
  • 14 March – St Asaph is named as one of three towns to be awarded city status in the United Kingdom as part of the celebrations for the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II; letters patent granted 1 June.
  • 15 March – Leanne Wood is announced as the new leader of Plaid Cymru.

    April

  • 3 April – Royal Navy and RAF helicopters rescue seven people from a cargo ship that has run aground near Colwyn Bay.
  • 20 April – It is announced that Bryn Terfel's annual music festival will be revived in July 2012, taking place at London's Southbank Centre.
  • 26 April – The Queen starts a two-day visit to Wales as part of her Diamond Jubilee tour. The communities visited over the Welsh section of her tour included Cardiff, Llandaff, Merthyr Tydfil, Aberfan, Ebbw Vale and Crickhowell.

    May

  • 3 / 4 May – In local elections the Labour Party take control of 10 of the 21 contested Welsh local authorities, a gain of 8.
  • 4 / 9 May – Urdd Gobaith Cymru holds its annual eisteddfod in Snowdonia.
  • 5 May - Wales Coast Path officially launched.
  • 8 May – Backing is given to construct the highest-generating onshore wind farm in Wales, located above the village of Glyncorrwg.
  • 14 May – Peter Hain, former Secretary of State for Wales and Shadow Secretary of State for Wales, resigns from front-line politics.
  • 19 May – Official MonmouthpediA opening.
  • 25 May – The Olympic torch starts its five-day tour of Wales, as part of the torch relay of the 2012 Summer Olympics. Gareth John, Chairman of Disability Sport Wales, becomes the first person to bring the torch onto Welsh soil.

    June

  • 2 / 5 June – The homecoming parade of the 1st The Queen's Dragoon Guards in Cardiff begins celebrations of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom. Many Welsh towns and cities hold street parties to celebrate the Jubilee, though there is a protest from an anti-monarchist group in Cardiff.
  • 9 June – An evacuation exercise gets under way at Aberystwyth after holidaymakers are trapped in a flooded caravan park. Several people are airlifted to safety by the Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service and Royal Air Force Sea King helicopters.
  • 19 June – Betws Primary School in Bridgend is seriously damaged by a fire that breaks out in the computer block during the school day; 219 pupils are safely evacuated.
  • 23 June – Christine James becomes the first woman appointed Archdruid of the National Eisteddfod of Wales.

    July

  • 1 July – The Warden of historic Llandovery College announces a rescue plan to enable the school to continue to function despite debts of more than £2m.
  • 5 July – The British Government announces plans to disband the 2nd Battalion, The Royal Welsh as part of cuts to the British Army.
  • 16 July – Data from the 2011 Census is released, showing the population of Wales has risen by 5% from 2,903,085 to 3,064,000 since 2001. The Census also shows the population of Cardiff has risen by 12%.
  • 24 July – Cadw acquires an 1854 miner's cottage in Cwmdare near Aberdare. The cottage is the youngest of the 128 buildings under Cadw's care.
  • 25 July – The first events of the 2012 Summer Olympics are held in Cardiff. Two matches in the women's football competition are held at the Millennium Stadium.

    August

  • 3 August – Only Men Aloud! headline the opening concert of the 2012 National Eisteddfod of Wales at Llandow in the Vale of Glamorgan.
  • 22 August – A group of scouts light the Paralympic flame on top of Snowdon, to be taken to Cardiff as part of the celebrations leading up to the start of the 2012 Summer Paralympics.

    September

  • 4 September – David Jones replaces Cheryl Gillan as Secretary of State for Wales in the UK government of David Cameron.
  • 10 September – Wales education minister, Leighton Andrews announces the regrading of hundreds of English GCSE papers, in a break from his English counterparts, who have refused to intervene.

    October

  • 1 October – A large-scale search operation begins as 5-year-old April Jones disappears while playing near her home in Machynlleth.
  • 15 October – Welsh National Opera reveal that they have received a donation of £1.2m from the Getty family, to help fund the production of several modern works, including Usher House by Gordon Getty.

    November

  • 2 November – In the wake of the Jimmy Savile sexual abuse scandal, BBC2 political programme Newsnight interview Steve Messham, a victim of the North Wales child abuse scandal. He incorrectly accuses a Thatcher-era Conservative politician of abusing him while he was in care. The fallout is severe for the BBC and also sees calls for a new policy inquiry into the original abuse case.
  • 12 November
  • *The National Assembly for Wales Act 2012 receives the Royal Assent. It is the first Act passed in Wales to become law in over 600 years. and is also the first bill passed by the Welsh assembly since it acquired direct law-making powers in March 2011. The bill gives the Welsh and English languages equal status in the assembly.
  • *TV presenter Anna Ryder Richardson is cleared of blame for an accident that occurred at her wildlife park in Tenby during August 2010; her husband, Colin MacDougall, is found guilty of breaches of health and safety legislation.
  • 15 November – The first national election to elect regional Police and Crime Commissioners for Wales is met with apathy, with only 344,213 people, a turnout of 14.9%, exercising their right to vote.
  • 19 November – The Silk Commission recommends that the Welsh Government should have the power to vary Income Tax in Wales by 2020.
  • 21 November – A legal challenge by Jonathan Swift, QC for the Attorney General, to a Welsh Assembly bill that would reform local government bye-laws, is overturned by the Supreme Court in London. This is the first time the National Assembly has seen one of its bills adjudicated by the Supreme Court.
  • 25 November – It is announced that the Venerable Janet Henderson will become the next Dean of Llandaff after John Thomas Lewis retired in July. Henderson will become the first female priest to hold the post.
  • 27 November – Hundreds of homes in St Asaph are flooded when the river Elwy burst its banks after heavy rainfall.

    December

  • 3 December
  • *It is announced that Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, is expecting a baby; it will be the Prince of Wales's first grandchild.
  • 11 December – Further data is released from the 2011 Census, it reveals several key facts about Wales:
  • *Two thirds of people living in Wales identified themselves as Welsh rather than British or another nationality. The local authority with the highest self-identification as Welsh was Rhondda Cynon Taf.
  • *The Census reveals that for every twenty people living in Wales, roughly 15 would have been born in Wales, 4 in neighbouring England and 1 from elsewhere.
  • *Those in Wales identifying their religion as Christianity fell to 58% a 14% drop since 2001, a larger decline than any English region.
  • *The number of people self-identifying themselves as Welsh speaking has dropped from 21% to 19% in the ten years between the two census, with only Gwynedd and Anglesey recording a Welsh language rate greater than 50%. One theory behind the drop in the statistics suggests that parents misidentify the ability of their children while at school.
  • 13 December – The rights to the 1972 film version of Under Milk Wood, which starred Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, are gifted to Wales by its director, Andrew Sinclair.
  • 14 December – It is announced that Charles, Prince of Wales is to become the patron of the festival to celebrate the centenary of the birth of Welsh poet Dylan Thomas.
  • 19 December – Cardiff Magistrates’ Court charges rock star Ian Watkins and two other female accomplices with six sexual offences against children, one charge included the conspiracy to rape a one-year-old girl.
  • 23 December – Heavy rain and flooding cause disruption across the country, affecting rail services and main roads.
  • 29 December
  • *S4C agree a new broadcasting deal with a breakaway group of more than 300 Welsh musicians and composers. The group, now represented by the Eos agency, left the Performing Rights Society in August after PRS reclassified BBC Radio Cymru as a regional rather than a national radio station.
  • *In the 2013 New Year Honours List, Welsh recipients include Dave Brailsford, Roger Williams MP and Susan Davies, head of Cynffig Comprehensive School.