At least they’re tackling the crisis in the fridge

From Gerard Baudains.

AS someone whose family has lived in Jersey for hundreds of years, I’m concerned to find myself seriously considering moving to another country.

Of course, the climate has something to do with it, but that is nothing when compared with the effect our government is having on Jersey and its inhabitants.

We have some politicians drawing £40k a year whose main interest appears to be the cost of sandwiches and number of juices in a fridge. Others promised ‘huge savings’ would accrue from the move to ministerial government when, in fact, costs have gone through the roof, as the system proves itself to be wholly unsuitable for Jersey.

My confidence was restored when real changes were proposed that would make our machinery of government not only work efficiently, but be more democratic to boot. Sadly, as usual, our elected motley crew made the wrong decision and rejected the proposal.

We have a balance of payments issue caused, not by the recession, but by our politicians’ decision to move to a zero-ten tax structure. Not only does this cost the Island over £100m a year in lost revenue, but it doesn’t comply with the EU Code of Business Taxation, which expressly forbids taxation which treats internal and external tax payers differently, including zero taxation.

So politicians who tell you ‘zero-ten complies’ are lying. If anyone wants to check, the Code has been around for a decade and is available on the Internet.

Why not move away from it now, before we’re forced to, and reduce the tax shortfall in the process? Guess our politicians are too dumb.

And how do our motley crew react to this £100m shortfall? Instead of getting our public sector in order, they cut essential services. Sacking cleaners and raising taxes is about what one might expect, given the calibre of some of them.

For instance, it has always intrigued me that the States thought a nurse would make an ideal head of a £100m organisation. It’s a bit like flying on holiday to be told ‘and today your pilot is John Bloggs, the best baggage handler in the company’.

It costs around £6k a year to educate a child, which is compulsory. The States pay 100 per cent of the cost of educating a child in a States school, but only 50 per cent for those in private schools, so parents sending their children to private schools are actually subsidising those who choose States schools.

Instead of proposing increasing the subsidy those parents pay, why doesn’t the minister charge a fee, means tested, for children attending States schools? It would be a lot fairer.

The latest wheeze is by Deputy Gorst of St Clement, the Social Security Minister who proposed raiding our pension fund to cover inefficiencies and poor management in another department. I thought only Robert Maxwell did things like that.

And our nurse backed the idea up with a nonsensical threat about doctors losing ability to practise. Looked like blackmail to me, designed to divert attention from her own failure to put her department in order.

And lastly, a couple of Constables have the answer to our traffic – slow it down. Of course, both are experts in this field and are fully aware that all the pavement widening, plethora of pedestrian crossings and other changes have not created a society that now steps into a road fully convinced that the government will ensure they come to no harm.

They know, too, that even without proof to endorse their statements, that the measure will increase safety. Presumably they don’t care either that their proposal will increase traffic pollution by around 100 per cent. Why should they, when even democracy cannot persuade them?

If a majority of drivers, who are also pedestrians at other times, drive a particular road at, say, an average of 35 mph, then imposing a limit of 30 mph is undemocratic.

So much for all these pledges to ‘listen to the public’.