By Douglas Kruger
Another week, another big construction company packing up shop.
Here’s how it will play out: They will tell us there were too many hurdles. Too many permits, licences, rules, restrictions, fees and obstacles. They will detail how businesses simply cannot remain profitable under such conditions, and that this fact is a threat to Jersey’s future.
We will nod sagely, agreeing that change is overdue.
And that same day, planning will introduce three more by-laws by which to make business harder and less competitive. Then fine a widow for selling the wrong kind of sandwich on the wrong side of a counter, and call it a day.
Planning needs reform. They’ve needed it for decades. The question is only: how?
They will never do it themselves. No department is incentivised to strip itself of power, people or funding, not while each individual’s pay scale is premised on how many underlings he can prop himself up with. In the light of mounting public criticism, their strongest move is speak enthusiastically about reform, then do nothing, diligently ignoring us and hoping economic reality simply goes away.
We see the same mindset writ large in the UK. They sit on a fortune in cost-mitigating energy reserves, even as the least popular government in history refuses to grant drilling permits. Policy over people, and let them eat cake.
For the leader brave (or angry) enough to wield the hatchet that could save our Island, here are seven suggestions; principles by which to rein in and trim down our Island’s most economically harmful government entity, in the interests of a revived economy:
1. Start a “registry of costs” and make it public
Permit every person who must comply with needless hurdles to publish the monetary cost of doing so, across the board, from the single citizen painting his fence, to the construction company awaiting permission to break ground. Let the Island see these costs in the aggregate, as they mount, on an ongoing basis. And not just the cost of compliance and delay, but also of projected earnings lost.
We will be appalled by the total monetary sacrifices forced upon our island by this one group. Utilise this outrage as a mechanism for enacting positive change: “Here is how much prosperity we forfeited to their decisions this month.”
2. Remove them from the jurisdiction of “environment”
Under environment, everything will always be “no”, forever. Every worm, hedge and slug will eternally outweigh human flourishing, with no sense of proportion. Instead, make them either an independent entity, or place them under the authority of economic development. Under economic development, the incentives change. They may still argue their point as an environmental safeguard, but the impetus will be to find a way to say “yes”. The point becomes “mitigation of harm during positive action”, rather than “prevention of all activity”.
3. Demand measurable reforms, not rhetoric
Reform should not remain a theory. Nor a motivational slogan. Force it into the realms of specific outcomes, determined by numbers. Have them provide a minimum quota of repeals per annum.
“This month, we excised the following needless and counterproductive regulations, in order to free up useful activity in the island, and to stop using tax resources to punish our own citizens.”
Failure to meet the target number of repeals should entail docked pay in the first instance, discipline in the second, dismissal thereafter, with departmental dissolution not out of the question.
4. Make private property off limits to them
A chief virtue of British law is that it is largely premised on the notion of private property. Firm this up in Jersey. Planning permission gets no say whatsoever over someone’s tree, driveway, bush, hedge, business or building. Why should they? It’s meddlesome and unnecessary, and they unceasingly prove themselves petty.
So long as it doesn’t pertain to a heritage site, move property beyond the scope of their authority.
If a political entity has final say over what you may or may not do with your private property, you are not free, and do not truly own anything.
This reversal of a long-accepted perversity would not be merely pragmatic. It would serve a moral imperative that they are currently transgressing. Why did we ever allow it in the first place?
5. Restructure the nature of prohibitions available to them
Prohibitive power should apply by broad category, not by minutiae. Like this:
“Are you planning to build a kids’ play area? Yes? Very well, that action is permitted. Proceed.”
And their authority ends there. No further meddling. No sub-categories by which they begin measuring hedges or deciding on the size of a wall.
So long as the citizen is not planning to erect a brothel, nuclear powerplant, or dungeon in which to hold political enemies, which are not permitted categories, their dealings with planning permission are at an end.
6. Reverse the burden of persuasion
Instead of us begging for a yes, make them explain a no. Put an end to citizens appearing in front of tribunals, arguing for permission before being dismissed and sent away. Any tribunal should be made up of citizens.
A representative from Planning may appear before them, and argue for the merits of their proposed restriction. We hear their case. We either concede, or overrule them. Less Soviet, more democratic.
7. Provide them with pro-commerce targets, and link targets to pay
“Show us what you have enabled this month”. If you can only show us what you have forbidden, prohibited or shut down, you will be viewed as a net negative for the Island and your continued existence as a department publicly debated.
No problem is permanent, unless we lack the will to solve it. It’s time to put an end to the perverse notion that a small clique of officials can hold an entire Island to ransom. And do so funded by the Island’s own tax money.
Douglas Kruger is an author and speaker based in St Helier. His books are all available via Amazon and Audible, including the brand new novel, House of the Judas Goat.
