Earlier this month the States Complaints Board found government had been heavy-handed in collecting tens of thousands of pounds from two homeowners who had properties overhanging the foreshore.
However, former Infrastrucutre Minister Eddie Noel has said the board’s findings, which could result in the two homeowners being repaid some of the monies, were off the mark.
And he said the chairman of the complaints board, Geoffrey Crill, should have stepped down due to potential conflict of interest – an opinion that he said he made known before the hearing.
‘I disagree with the findings of the Complaints Board entirely,’ he said. ‘In fact, prior to them sitting I wrote to the Greffier that I believed the chairman was conflicted and they should have had someone else in the chair.
‘He’s a lawyer. He was a partner of a number of firms. Over the years, they would have acted for a number of people buying and selling properties on the foreshore.’
The two homeowners – Alan Luce and Julian Mallinson – brought the complaint after they were forced to pay more than £50,000 in compensation between them when selling their properties at Grève d’Azette in 2016.
The panel found the actions of Infrastructure and Jersey Property Holdings to be ‘unjust, oppressive and improperly discriminatory’ and the new minister Kevin Lewis now has until early August to respond to the findings.
But Mr Noel remained defiant that seeking compensation from the homeowners was the correct course of action.
‘These are people that encroached on public land,’ he said. ‘It was public land at the time. It had been owned by the Crown and is now owned by the people of Jersey. So they encroached on someone else’s land.’
He added: ‘If someone encroaches on your property, what do you do about it? You either ignore it. You can’t do that if you are the public. Do you ask them to take it away? Or do you reach a negotiated settlement?’
While the Complaints Board found that the homeowners were in a ‘vulnerable’ position as they needed to settle the matter in order to complete the sales of their properties, Mr Noel said that the sales were the natural time to pursue the matter.
‘It tends to come about when we are party to a sale contract,’ he said. ‘That’s how we get to know about it. It’s difficult to spot every encroachment.
‘What the department is going to be doing going forward over the next years is be proactive about it. That involves employing more States employees to do it.’
He added: ‘I don’t believe their findings actually were reflective of the evidence that was presented. But that is for the new minister. He has two months to respond.’
