- 1. Some Islanders treat St Peter’s Valley as their personal dump
After several large items and bags of rubbish were left in St Peter’s Valley, the parish’s Constable, Richard Vibert, and one of the government’s environmental protection officers, Richard Runacres, issued calls for Islanders to report fly-tippers. And quite right, too.
What possible excuse can these people have for dumping their bin bags and, in one case, most of a toilet in this green and serene part of the Island? It is a crime borne of laziness, because not only does each parish operate a weekly refuse collection service, not only are there mini-recycling-centres dotted around the Island, not only do many parishes offer kerbside recycling schemes and glass collection… but there is also a first-class recycling hub to be found at La Collette.
Mr Runacres hit the nail on the head when he said: ‘I can’t understand it because we do have all the facilities that are needed. The annoying thing is that the people who do this know when and where to go.’
Perhaps if you see anybody fly-tipping you can tell them where to go… figuratively or literally.
- 2. The north of St Helier may have a greener future
St Helier Constable Simon Crowcroft’s mission to add more greenery in and around town was bolstered this week following promising comments from Chief Minister Kristina Moore. The Constable has long sought to extend the Millennium Town Park – an area he has often called a ‘green lung’ for the north of the parish.
After learning that 98% of the children who attend Springfield School did not have access to outdoor space at home, Deputy Moore said that there ‘were ways’ to achieve both an expansion of the park into the former Jersey Gas site and improve primary-school facilities in the area.
Given that the decision to build the park in the first place involved ten years of debate and a precariously positioned ringbinder during the final States vote, we won’t be holding our breath.
- 3. Going viral isn’t advised
As we have recently passed through a significant global health crisis, news of a single case of a rare disease that carries a low risk of harm may not sound quite as serious as it would have done had it emerged three years ago.
Monkey pox has been detected in one person in Jersey and sounds no fun at all. Symptoms include unexpected or unusual spots, ulcers or blisters anywhere on the body, a high temperature, a headache, muscle aches, backache, swollen glands, chills and exhaustion, with a rash usually appearing between one and five days after the initial symptoms.
But let’s keep calm. After all, one case of pox does not a pandemic make.
- 4. Owning a restaurant can be taxing
The stakes (or should that be steaks?) are high in the restaurant game, with one entrepreneur recently being asked to settle two large debts after his operation ceased trading. The recently closed Shinzo restaurant in St Aubin is said to owe more than £63,000 in ITIS tax payments and £70,000 in outstanding social security contributions.
Money may be off the menu at the moment, with the steak and sushi eatery having closed permanently in May.
- 5. Holy rollers could be heading to church
What is a skateboarding pastor’s favourite trick? A Methodist air… ba-dum-tish.
You can’t walk anywhere these days without coming across a patch of land that someone wants to turn into a skate park. Les Quennevais, South Hill… St Ouen Methodist Church. That’s right, that fusty, dusty old building on Route de Trodez could become the trendiest new youth hang out if: plans are drawn up, submitted, considered and approved.
There’s a long way to go at this stage and the Island’s appetite for offering young people ramps and rails to slide down and across may well wane before long. Let’s hope this project can gain momentum and traction – two things every skater needs – because providing another skate park is surely preferable to maintaining the church as a grand storage unit.
- 6. Skaters may not be heading west this summer
See – didn’t I say that skating was quite the hot topic at the moment?
Just as one new facility is proposed, a delay has been announced for another. Those who had been hoping to hop on their boards to ride to the Les Quennevais skate park this summer will no doubt have been disappointed to hear that the facility is probably not going to be open until mid-October.
Hopefully there won’t be any further issues that halt progress at the site.
- 7. Loads of homes will be built – just not for humans
In what could well turn out to be ‘the summer of the sting’, record numbers of Asian-hornet nests are popping up across the Island. Fifty have been discovered so far this year, mostly in the east.
Top hornet hunter Alastair Christie this week announced that his team had tackled ‘five in a day’, a record for the unit, and added that larger secondary nests were also being found.
Population, it seems, is set to be an issue in the insect world as well.
- 8. Puffin protection is being planned
Imagine this: you’re a wild ferret or a rat and you enjoy nothing more than scouring the north-west coast in search of tasty puffin eggs or newly hatched ‘pufflings’ (the overly cute name for puffin chicks). Well, the jig may soon be up for Jersey’s slinky predators, because the National Trust for Jersey and the Birds on the Edge project are hoping to raise funds to create a seabird reserve that could involve a ‘predator-exclusion fence’ along the cliffs below the footpath between the Lecq Clay Shooting Range and the Plémont headland.
- 9. All fishermen should be called Frank
Tempers have cooled enough for fishermen from France to meet operators from Jersey to discuss keeping calm heads at sea.
The talks marked the first such discussions since Norman and Breton vessels blockaded the Harbour in May last year during a protest about post-Brexit fishing rights in Jersey’s waters.
President of the Jersey Fishermen’s Association Don Thompson was characteristically open about the nature of the discussions and said: ‘Typical of fishermen, the meeting was very forthright. We got right to the point and did not hold back.’
- 10. 12,000 of you are cutting it close with the tax return deadline
There is zero joy to be had in filing your tax return. Nil. Zilch. Nada.
It’s just another of life’s little administrative burdens that has to be done – preferably before midnight on Sunday. That is the final deadline for online submissions, the deadline for hardcopies having been and gone weeks ago.
With roughly 12,000 returns yet to be filed, it seems that there are a good chunk of Islanders who are content to act as last-minute Larries; either that or they get some sort of adrenaline rush from waiting as long as possible before attending to their forms.
If you’re among those yet to submit your return, don’t leave it too long. The only thing worse than having to pay taxes is being fined £300 for not declaring them in time.
