If there's no demand for the new Sunday trading service shopkeepers just won't open

I’m not altogether sure – because it wasn’t explained to me when first I heard it – whether the soubriquet was used affectionately or otherwise but for no particular reason I thought of it the other day when I read his rant about Sunday trading.

Along with many others who’ve commented on his letter, I happen to think that because it appears that his family-owned department store will be among those retailers not permitted to open under revised Sunday trading laws then there may well be a measure of self-interest in his claim that the decision was ‘an attack on Jersey’s way of life and culture’.

Despite a fairly regular intake of Calvados – albeit for health purposes – my memory remains pretty good, although more so perhaps for what happened ten or more years ago than for the shopping list Herself expected me to memorise this morning when I was despatched to the metropolis.

In that context I find it extremely difficult to recall young Mr Voisin – in the years he was one of our elected representatives – being a champion of either the Island’s way of life or its culture. I may well be wrong and have no doubt that the former Deputy will be quick to bring me to heel should that be the case.

As to the issue of Sunday trading itself, for all his altruistic protestations about the welfare of the 8,000 people employed in the retail industry, Mr Voisin is first, foremost and will remain, for as long as he holds the reins of his store, a businessman whose principal task – in common with all others in his position – is to run his business in a way that will maximise profits.

There’s nothing wrong with that – we know only too well and to our cost what happens when governments try to run businesses – but what it means is that no one in their right mind would operate an enterprise such as Voisin’s at a time or on a day when it was not profitable to do so and the same almost certainly applies to every other retailer.

This is a holiday destination which, it may interest Mr Voisin to know, is desperately trying to remain attractive to tourists and fend off competition from thousands of other locations all around the globe. Herself and I make fairly regular trips across the water to France where they manage to open big shops and little shops on all seven days in the week without, it seems to me, a great deal of hassle from anyone and certainly without such a practice being viewed as an attack on the French way of life or the country’s culture. Indeed, the practice is an integral part of the country’s way of life, as Mr Voisin should know, given that there was a branch of his store in St Malo, and to remove it would certainly be an attack on their way of life.

But he shouldn’t worry too much. If there’s no demand for the new Sunday trading service, you can bet your bottom dollar that shopkeepers simply won’t open – it really is as simple as that.

I was intrigued to read of the 313 (at least) creatures which have been carefully trapped and removed from near a rock face at Bellozanne and found new homes prior to the rock face being demolished to make way for a sludge treatment facility.

I suppose it’s a sign of the times that we as a society should go to such lengths to protect the habitat and lives of creatures such as the seven species involved in this particular exercise and to be honest it’s a welcome sign so long as the whole thing is kept in perspective.

What I can’t for the life of me understand is the somewhat churlish attitude of one of the online correspondents – he or she goes by the pen name of Veg E Tarian, for the avoidance of doubt – who remarked: ‘And the people who relocated the animals went home to a lovely roast dinner safe in the knowledge that lives had been saved. One form of life (a) protected species, another (an) evening meal – hypocrisy?’

To start off with, the correspondent has absolutely no idea at all whether those involved in the animal removal operation went home to a bowl of vegetable soup or indeed the roast dinner that he or she assumed they had.

As far as I am concerned, if people are prepared to fabricate scenarios in order to put or strengthen their particular viewpoint then I tend to take much less notice of them than might otherwise be the case.

Secondly, I think I am safe in assuming that Veg E Tarian’s diet will consist principally of vegetables. It may interest them to know that many years ago one of the Dimblebys – either the father or one of his two sons – presented a BBC programme in which a plant was wired up to sensors in the studio.

The experiment was designed to show not only they felt pain but that they were aware also of when pain was likely to be inflicted. I remember it vividly because the sensors not only ‘bleeped’ when a leaf was cut with scissors but then bleeped again every time the person with the scissors approached the plant.

It convinced me that plants are no different to any other living creatures when it comes to pain and fear. Enjoy that spud you’ve just peeled, Veg E Tarian.

AND finally… The wheel has turned full circle. Remove the planning minister from planning decisions and replace him with a committee of seven States Members. An obituary for ministerial government?