Gŵyr Community Land Trust CiC

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Gŵyr Community Land Trust CiC Creating environments for resilient communities to thrive. Values:

GENUINELY AFFORDABLE

Our houses will be affordable for local people forever.

Aims and Vision:

A world where communities are empowered to re-imagine their own surroundings, for themselves & for generations to come. We are a group of local people who have come together having identified the common need for affordable housing in the Gower fringe area. We aim to build sustainable, zero carbon, low impact, stylish, healthy community-led homes for both local residents and the environment to thrive, which will become a replicable model for sustainable housing developments throughout Wales and the UK. We are actively seeking a plot of land of 1.5 to 5 acres or more to build 10 guaranteed affordable homes. There is a huge need for affordable housing on Gower, to enable a broader range of households to live here. We will use an affordable rental and shared ownership model to ensure that the homes are affordable, even after re-sale. Our cutting edge model sets rents and sale prices at a level which is genuinely affordable for people who work locally, even those in low paid but essential jobs. COMMUNITY-LED AND COMMUNITY-BUILT

We will use a community-led approach which will be driven by local people, members and residents. All members of Gŵyr CLT live and work locally and are themselves in housing need. We will work with our local community to find a site, concept and design which serves everyone. We will carry out at least 50% of the construction process ourselves, allowing residents to acquire sweat equity, enabling people without significant capital to get onto the housing ladder. DESIGNED FOR PEOPLE NOT PROFIT

We will use a cohousing design to create a strong, supportive, healthy and resilient community. We will prioritise shared open spaces over large private gardens, pedestrians over cars and provide shared facilities. We believe resilience comes through strong networks of support and we aim to actively encourage this through design, how we live and how we organise. We will create a community which is multi-generational and allows us to support each other through all stages of life, from young children to the elderly. The design will be interwoven with biodiverse, wild spaces, working with the natural environment rather than against it. LOW IMPACT LIVING

We will create zero-carbon homes which enable truly sustainable lifestyles. We rapidly need to reduce the carbon emissions of our buildings, and this is not happening quickly enough. Through the design and materials our houses are built from; how we supply our energy and water; growing our own food on site; and setting aside spaces for biodiversity and carbon capture, we will aim to bring our environmental footprint to a level where the people and planet can thrive. REPLICABLE

We will create a new and successful model for sustainable, community-led housing in Wales. We will use experience gained to support other groups to establish high quality, affordable housing projects in their own areas and become a blueprint for other community-based groups, councils and organisations wishing to pursue community-led housing. We will open-source all of our learning and all aspects of our model, so that we can push forward the growth of community-led housing across Wales and the UK.

Gower Land Trust CIC - winding upAs people will know, our proposal to build 14 new zero carbon affordable homes in Bisho...
09/04/2026

Gower Land Trust CIC - winding up

As people will know, our proposal to build 14 new zero carbon affordable homes in Bishopston was refused planning in December. After taking some time to process this, we have made the sad decision to wind up Gwyr CLT as a formal organisation. It has been a wild roller coaster over the last 5 years, we have had real heart aches, moments of incredibly challenging conflict, but also made friends for life, and gained huge amounts of experience.

We started out as a group of strangers, meeting in a cafe in Mumbles, all sharing the same terrible experience of insecure rental housing, with a determination to do something about it, for ourselves and other people in our community. We didn’t know the first thing about developing housing, and it has been a huge journey even to get where we did, one which took us all around the UK, being welcomed into other Community-led housing projects on visits, and which connected us with a world of passionate people determined to solve the housing crisis in their own areas in their own grass roots way.

Why did the project not happen?

Sadly we were not able to convince the council planning department that this project was valuable and planning was refused. We went to appeal, but the planning inspector chose to go with the council’s opinion. The council planners did everything in their power to crush our project, and ensure it didn’t happen. We do not fully understand why there was such a strong determination amongst certain members of Swansea Council’s planning department that this project should not happen, right from the start. The council, who claimed to not have the resources to attend any additional meetings, or in fact ever meet us face to face (after many tens of thousands of pounds spent, and 3 years in the planning system, we have never met a single member of the planning department in the flesh), seemed to have almost unlimited resources to invest in unearthing any conceivable barrier to this project happening. In the end the reasons given for the refusal, which centred around how affordable housing is managed, could easily have been solved through fairly minor tweaks to our policy wording.

We naively assumed because our project was being created by the very people who needed secure homes which were not being provided by the council or any other means, and that it was grass roots and locally based, this would be a reason for the council to support this project. In fact, this was the reason in the end, that they fought so vehemently to stop it happening.

Could we find another site?

With a community-led housing project you only get one shot to take a project to planning. The amount of time that is required to get a project like this to planning stage is incredible, and all of that was done by unpaid members of Gwyr CLT, squeezing the time in around full time work and looking after kids. Across the 5 years we have been running, in total our members have clocked up well over 10,000 hours of work, all of which was unpaid, albeit for resident members in the hope that one day they may get the opportunity to buy or rent permanent and secure homes. Our members simply do not have capacity to do it all again.

What will happen to the site?

We didn't own the site, we had a legal agreement with the owner, which was based on getting planning permission. Therefore the field will stay with the landowner, although we suspect it will be sold to a developer, with the hope that they will get full planning permission down the line, the developer will make a fortune, and none of the homes will be actually affordable (but maybe we can be positive).

What about the money?

One of the achievements we are really proud of, is that we managed to secure a first of its kind grant from Welsh Government, which if planning was approved would have totalled nearly £900,000. This would have been spent on ensuring homes were affordable and would have been safeguarded for every future occupier. In the end, to submit the planning application, around £170,000 of this was spent, with the rest staying with Welsh Government!! Yes that’s four zeros on the end there. And that is completely normal for a planning application! That’s not money that was spent on bricks or mortar, or roads or schools, but simply on the bureaucracy and paper work of putting in a planning application. And we wonder why no new homes are being built!! Any surplus which is left when Gwyr CLT winds up (which is less than £1000) will be transferred to another community interest company or charity.

Was it worth it?

We are obviously incredibly gutted that the planning was refused. Had it been approved, we would be on site now, building zero carbon, permanently affordable homes together! And the complete waste of that opportunity is heartbreaking. Many many individuals and families who have been part of the project, whether planning to live in the homes, or just because they believed in it, dedicated so much time and sacrificed countless evenings, weekends and sleepless nights to the project. However, do we regret starting out with Gwyr CLT. Hell no!! Sometimes when you believe in something, you just have to go for it with both feet. And that’s what we did. Sadly it didn’t go our way, but the housing crisis still exists, and is in fact getting worse. And the council DO NOT CARE!! So people have to stand up and be counted, and that’s what we feel like we have done.

What’s next?

Gower Land Trust CIC (Which was the registered company name of Gwyr CLT), will be winding up. As an informal group of people, we won’t be meeting regularly, but we will keep our email and facebook live, so please feel free to get in touch. Who knows, maybe one day we may have the energy and drive to start another project.

A big thanks!!

Thanks to everyone who has supported us over the years, we regularly got messages from people all over Wales telling us people were inspired by what we were trying to do, and that honestly made all the difference, especially when confronted with challenges which made us question whether it was all worth it. And thanks to Cwmpas particularly Claire and Jonathan, as well as the rest of the professional team (Architects, planning consultant, ecologist etc), who completely bought into the vision and the community-led approach, it was amazing to work with all these people.

So for the time being, that’s Gwyr CLT out!!

Thanks everyone

The Gwyr CLT team

As people are probably aware, our planning application for 14 new affordable homes, as well as 4 acres of community gree...
16/02/2026

As people are probably aware, our planning application for 14 new affordable homes, as well as 4 acres of community green space was turned down by the planning inspector.

Although we were aware the planning application could be rejected, we were shocked by the total inability of the both the council and the planning inspector to see any merit in this being a community-led scheme, i.e. created by residents and the local community, to meet an identified need. In fact we strongly believe, that had this exact application been submitted by a developer or housing association, then it would have been approved. For anyone with a keen interest, this is our response to the four major issues raised by the council, and in which the inspector chose to side with the council.

If you want to read he full inspectors report, it is available on the council's website by searching for application - 2024/2259/FUL

16/12/2025

PLANNING APPEAL UPDATE: We have had the appeal response back and our planning appeal has been dismissed, meaning planning permission has been rejected and the project will not go ahead.

We are obviously gutted about the decision, as this project has been the culmination or nearly 5 years of incredibly hard work and commitment from a huge number of people, including members, supporters and the professionals involved in putting together the scheme and application.

The primary reason for rejecting the application seems to boil down to the fact that the inspector does not believe community groups can build and manage affordable housing. It seems incredible to us, that making sure housing is genuinely affordable for ever is THE primary purpose of GCLT & Community-led housing in general, and that the government can make endless statements about their support for community-led housing, but then refuse the planning application, mainly on the basis that the project IS community-led, and not being delivered by existing organisations such as the council or housing associations.

The message seems clear, community groups can only build affordable housing if it is being entirely controlled and mediated by the exact organisations who are currently failing to deliver the homes that people need.

This will take a while to digest properly, but thanks to everyone who has supported us on the journey. We have no regrets about this project, and believe wholeheartedly in community-led housing. Sometimes you have to stand up for things you believe in, but that doesn’t always mean you will succeed.

We wish everyone a happy Christmas, and we’ll be making a statement about our next steps in the new years.

Thanks

The GCLT team

Address

The Gower Peninsula
Swansea

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