A team of pupils from St Albans RC High School in Pontypool have been crowned the Welsh Young Consumers of the Year.
In a hotly contested final held recently at The Pavilion in Llandrindod Wells the winning team beat off the challenge of thirteen other teams from all over Wales.
The team of four pupils, Liam Cowles, Katie Porter, James Fenn and Oliver Cross, who had already won the Torfaen heat of the competition, had to show off their knowledge on a range of subjects including consumer law, health and social responsibility, food, safety, environment, legal matters, money and finance and Europe.
Jacqui Morgan, Chair of Wales Heads of Trading Standards, said, “Pupils from all over Wales were a credit to their respective authorities and the knowledge displayed by these pupils shows the merit of educating young people about their consumer rights and good citizenship at a very early age.”
St Albans will now represent Wales, together with the runners-up Ysgol Gyfun Emlyn (Carmarthenshire), at the National Finals of the competition which take centre stage at the Trading Standards Institute conference being held in Edinburgh in June.
The competition which is organised nationally by the Trading Standards Institute and locally by Torfaen council’s trading standards team was supported locally by the Mayor, Councillor Bob Jones, Councillor Gwyneira Clark, executive member for planning and public protection and Councillor Sarah Richards, chair of the safer communities overview and scrutiny committee .
Alan Branch-O`Neill (Chairman of the Welsh YCOY Organising Committee) said: “A team from Wales were UK champions in 2003 and staff from trading standards will be giving all the help they can to both St Albans and Ysgol Gyfun Emlyn in the hope that they can bring the trophy back to Wales again.”
