Police are investigating a complaint that a man attending a conference at the Centre for Alternative Technology near Machynlleth was subjected to “outrageous abuse” by security staff.

Jonathan Crewdson, who was attending a solar training course at the centre over the weekend of Saturday and Sunday, 17 and 18 August, said he was confronted by two security men who he said threatened to have him arrested for sleeping in a camper van in the centre’s car park as there were no beds available.

Mr Crewdson told the Cambrian News he did not believe the two men had licences to operate as security officers.

During the confrontation, Mr Crewdson said he was threatened with being arrested by one of the men, who said he was a security guard and he said he was told he would be forcibly removed if he didn’t leave the car park.

While Mr Crewdson, who is from Skipton in Yorkshire, insisted that the matter would not have been an issue for the police, he says he was told repeatedly that the police would be called and he would be arrested, and said the two men who spoke to him had “lied” about there being signs up at the car park saying that camping was not allowed.

In a letter to CAT, he has called for action to be taken against the two men.

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