More strikes, lots of bed bugs but no gas. Richard Heath looks back on October
BY the start of this year, we all knew that our hospital was falling to bits and that, many, many moons from now we’ll hopefully get a new one. But we didn’t know that parts of it had been built with the construction-material equivalent of an Aero bar.
That little surprise came about in early October when it was revealed that RAAC concrete – a light and bubbly form of the proper stuff which was popular among builders back in the day – had been discovered in three areas of the Gloucester Street building. The material was deemed so dangerous that it led to the closure of dozens of buildings in the UK, but in a statement which didn’t seem particularly reassuring if you dwelt on it for too long, Infrastructure Minister Tom Binet said that a structural collapse at the Hospital was “unlikely”. The Health Department later confirmed that there was no risk to patients or staff, and at the time of writing the Hospital was still standing.
It may not have come as a surprise to anyone who had seen the size of the queue outside McDonald’s on a Saturday afternoon, but the front-page of the JEP on 7 October revealed that the youth of today were getting larger. Teenagers’ waist bands had a few inches on the kids of yesteryear, and, shockingly, a quarter of children aged four were classed as overweight. But a separate report later in the month revealed that we were living an average of two years longer than people in the UK. So, either, one of them was wrong, or a Big Mac is actually a misunderstood health food.
A bid to save Jersey Reds rugby club from collapse by securing further government funding was voted down by States Members. Following the debate, Economic Development Minister Kirsten Morel expressed his sadness over the whole affair but repeated his view about “putting money into a financial blackhole”.
Later in the month, ministers set out their proposals for a wind farm which would generate so much electricity we could flog some to the French. States Members will be asked to give their in-principle support for the proposal next March but before that the rest of the Island are being asked for their views.
If only we had done this years ago and the whole Island was powered by wind, the Great Gas Outage of 2023 would never have been a thing. It all started with a few people taking to social media to report that their gas wasn’t working, and asking whether anyone else was having the same problem. Turns out they were. More than 4,000 homes and businesses (that’s every single Island Energy customer) were left without gas. The company blamed a “rogue code” in its software, which didn’t mean anything to anyone. It also said that it would take days to get everyone back up and running. In the end, some people reported being gasless for weeks, and at the time of writing were waiting for some compensation.
And then Jersey Electricity got in on the act. More than 2,000 customers were plunged into darkness on the evening of 18 October when a dodgy underground cable in St Helier went ping. In a statement which seemed as though it was having a prod at its beleaguered competitor, JE said: “we understand the significant inconvenience caused by power interruptions”. Perhaps they weren’t, but anyway, they restored most people’s supply within an hour.
Upholding the fine tradition of 2023, the teachers went on strike again. And in a demonstration which showed just how far unions have come since the heated, violent protests of, say, the miners’ strikes, the NEU held a “Strikers Family Walk and Picnic” along St Aubin’s Bay. And some even wore hi-vis jackets, presumably to ensure those health and safety boxes were ticked. Later in the month, teachers threatened to step up their action after being left “incensed” by a pay deal offer to (and accepted by) the head teachers. The NASUWT said that cash set aside to “improve the student experience” had been used to fund the settlement.
In a story to mull over in the early hours when you can’t sleep, the JEP reported that pest controllers had seen a massive rise in beg bugs. And to hammer home the message, we published pictures of two of the creatures on our front page which only a few easily frightened readers thought were life-size. Similar increases had been reported in France and parts of the UK. Frank Raimbault, of Absolute Pest Control, said he had dealt with more bedbug jobs in Jersey in the previous five months than “in the past five years”.
Following a revamped summer Battle of Flowers parade held in the middle of the two-month-long rain shower of July and August, it was announced that the Christmas version wasn’t going to happen this year. Organisers said that the event was a “considerable call” on its “limited resources” but hoped the parade would return next year.
And hundreds of people once again gathered for the JEP’s Pride of Jersey Awards to honour the unsung heroes and those special people who make this Island what it is. During an emotional ceremony at Albert Bartlett’s headquarters, awards were handed out across 14 categories, honouring brilliant teachers, doting grandparents, community heroes and star children. And many were left in tears when Islander Dean Lowe, who was tragically killed alongside his young son Charlie in a suspected hit-and-run during the summer, was announced as the winner of the special Gary Burgess Award. Mr Lowe, who worked for the Jersey Employment Trust, was a tireless campaigner for inclusion, a well-known and respected musician and a much-loved member of the Island community.
