THE recent announcements of job losses in Newport should bring to attention the huge and costly barrier to employment and business the Severn Bridge has become. Having spent most of my working life, like many in Newport, working in Bristol where I have always found jobs plentiful and fairly well paid, the only jobs existing in Wales are public sector that have been moved into Cardiff and I notice the requirement to speak or learn Welsh has now crept into all the job specs there.

The times I have managed to secure a job, albeit on low pay, after two years the grant runs out and they go kicking and screaming back across the bridge.

I have heard from an ex-colleague who worked for a firms relocation business that Wales is usually ruled out because of the cost of the bridge (and running a large fleet of lorries at £20 a time could be considerable) and the perception, although I believe it to be untrue, that many people have all the documentation produced in Wales duplicated in Welsh although the road the WAG is going on this could actually be the case soon.

I have heard figures of 90 million a year banded about for re-nationalising of the bridge which is considerable, but the benefits would be immense.

The Assembly costs £500 million annually and does nothing for Wales or the Welsh economy and I invite anyone to watch ministers Question Time, which is presently on iPlayer, to disagree.

Bradley, Caerleon Road, Newport