THE ‘downgrading’ of New Quay lifeboat station will leave coastal communities vulnerable, AM Elin Jones has warned.

The New Quay lifeboat community are running a campaign to halt the downgrading of their current Mersey-class all-weather lifeboat to a smaller Atlantic 85 inshore lifeboat (B class).

Now Ms Jones has called on Carl Sargeant, the Welsh Government’s Cabinet Secretary for Communities, to throw his weight behind the campaign as well as making representations to the RNLI and to the UK Government Minister for Transport, whose department includes the Maritime and Coastguard Agency.

“Over the last few months, I have met several times with volunteers of the RNLI in New Quay along with MP Ben Lake,” she told the Minister.

“The volunteers feel that this vessel would not be appropriate for the coast of Ceredigion, which would be left without an adaptable and highly responsive rescue ship.

“The current lifeboat at New Quay has a range of 240 nautical miles (440 km), it carries a crew of six people, an additional inflatable lifeboat which it can deploy at sea and has a survivor compartment that can carry 43 people.

“The RNLI are proposing that it is replaced with an Atlantic 85 is an inshore lifeboat, which has almost half the capacity of crew and rescue survivors.

“The proposed lifeboat is not suitable for use in all weathers, it is a much smaller ship than that which is currently deployed in New Quay, and it will vastly restrict the capability of rescuing people at sea from the station.

“The RNLI volunteers have showed me evidence of the effect that this downgrading will have on Ceredigion’s coast, and have raised concerns that people at sea would be left at considerable risk.

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