2008 in Wales - Events

Events

• 18 January - Last working of Tower Colliery, the last deep mine in the South Wales Valleys (official closure: 25 January).
• 24 January - Peter Hain resigns from his government offices (including Secretary of State for Wales) after the Electoral Commission refers to the Metropolitan Police his failure to report donations amounting to £100,000.
• 25 January - Official closure of Tower Colliery in the Cynon Valley, the last deep coal mine to be worked in Wales.
• 11 February - At the 50th Grammy Awards in Los Angeles, California, the Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording goes to Hansel and Gretel, starring Rebecca Evans.
• 18 February - Plans to publish Wales's first daily newspaper in the Welsh language, under the title Y Byd (The World), are abandoned because of inadequate finance.
• March - Harpist Catrin Finch gives the broadcast première of Alun Hoddinott's Serenissima on BBC Radio 3, shortly before the composer's death.
• 1 March - St David's Day Cardiff sees record breaking numbers march in the annual St David's Day parade, from the National Museum of Wales for Y Senedd in Cardiff Bay.
• 7 March - The Queen visits Swansea to open its new leisure centre, a replacement for the building she opened in 1977.
• 16 April
  • Swansea's new bowls stadium hosts the World Indoor Singles and Mixed Pairs Championship for bowls.
  • First minister Rhodri Morgan officially opens Amazon.co.uk's 400,000 sq ft (37,000 m2) Fulfilment Centre in Jersey Marine.
• 1 May - All Wales local council elections.
• 31 May - Swansea Bay Film Festival begins.
• 12 June - Cardiff Castle opens a new interpretation centre at a cost of £6 million.
• 14 June - In the Queen's Birthday honours list, Russell T Davies is awarded the OBE and Joe Calzaghe the CBE.
• 28 June - At the Wales Book of the Year Awards, Heritage Minister Rhodri Glyn Thomas reads out the wrong name, and runner-up Tom Bullough arrives on stage only to find he has lost out to Dannie Abse. Bullough comments "The Book of the Year event was out-and-out the worst night of my life."
• 18 July - Rhodri Glyn Thomas resigns from his position in the Welsh Assembly Government after having been reprimanded for smoking in a pub.
• 2 August - The National Eisteddfod of Wales opens in Cardiff.
• 11 August - A resurvey of Mynydd Graig Goch in the Moel Hebog group of Snowdonia summits determines its height to be 2,000ft 6in (609.75m) rather than the 1998ft (609m) previously recorded, qualifying it as a mountain.
• 12 September - The Tower, Meridian Quay, is topped out, becoming the tallest building in Swansea and the tallest residential building in Wales.
• 5 October - Delyth Morgan, Baroness Morgan of Drefelin, replaces Kevin Brennan as Lords Minister for the Department for Children, Schools and Families.
• 20 November - AM and Heritage Minister Alun Ffred Jones makes history by using the Welsh language for the first time as a representative of the UK government at a European Union meeting in Brussels.
• 14 December - Trinity College, Carmarthen, announces negotiations with University of Wales, Lampeter, with a view to a merger.
• 19 December - A haul of 22 million counterfeit cigarettes, the biggest such seizure ever in Wales, is recovered by Cardiff customs officers in a container from Dubai.
• 31 December - In the New Year Honours 2009, Michael Sheen is awarded the OBE and Owain Arwel Hughes the CBE. Cyclists Nicole Cooke and Geraint Thomas receive the MBE.