Saturday’s headlines in the JEP concerning the recent move by  Guernsey to create an exclusive fishing zone, preventing Jersey’s fleet access, provoked me in to writing the following letter to Andy Sibcy.

“Your article on the Jersey’s fishing fleets dilemma concerning the loss of fishing rights to Guernsey’s quick actions in securing pole position over the island’s waters highlights the disparity between the issue of diversification mooted at hustings and the actuality of an industry threat. There seem few pragmatic solutions.

Sidelined as a quaint occupation, or neutered by EU restrictions the Jersey fleet still creates a livelihood for around a hundred boats and crew.

It provides fresh fish to local restaurants and services a massive export industry with shellfish in particular.

Under a punishing regime, combating bureaucracy and the need to fish in the poorest of weathers they have survived by sheer tenacity and a sense of constant purpose.

With the finance industry under threat from global forces we need to look keenly at what local industries we can support before their hopes are dashed by a lack of political support.

There are three potential wins here.

• Securing the existence of an industry under threat thereby creating a sustainable continuance of both an historic exporter and employer.
• Using the current problem as a platform for pan island development opening discussions and working together with a proactive collaboration.
• By working on the above the people of this island can begin to see physical evidence not just of diversification in action but also of a government willing to support a group of individuals that for some time have been suffering from neglect.

It would be shameful if this important issue is not addressed and a solution found to satisfy everyone.”

A couple of winters ago I had the idea for HAND – Help A Neighbour Day. Everybody seemed to be snowed in and couldn’t move. The old in particular appeared isolated.

I passed the idea on to the JEP but they weren’t too enamored with it. I don’t blame them. It’s riddled with problems but the basic idea is sound. So I just let it remain in my notebook.

The basic idea is once a week/month we help those who can’t help themselves by just doing a bit of shopping or generally just helping those who can’t help themselves.

We need to connect with those members of our community who are vulnerable and allow them to contact us when they really need it help.

If anyone reads this and has any thoughts about it I’d love to know how to advance the idea further.

I’ve stated many times that the real heart of what I do is to help others either discover their own potential or urge them to simply get involved. The two letters following exemplify two individuals who although giving me credit actually took time to get involved and found it deeply rewarding and they changed things.

The first is from Andy Le Seeleur of ParentsForChoice.

Rod played a fundamental role in forming ParentsForChoice, a lobby group established to counter government proposals to slash grants paid to fee paying schools. At a time when a few parents took it upon themselves to try and do something to oppose the cuts, Rod volunteered his time and brought a balanced approach, which ensured the group presented its case in the best possible way.

As the political temperature rose, Rod continued to give his typical balanced view – being Chair of Governors of a States secondary school, he was able to see both sides of the argument in a highly emotive situation which enabled P4C to win respect and get their views heard at the very highest level, resulting in a positive outcome.

The next is from Laura Storey.

In 2008, just before the St Helier No 2 hustings, I noticed a planning application notice at Ann Court advising that the property was to be demolished and turned into a temporary car park.

I investigated this further and found out that the long term plans for the Ann Court site was to eventually build an 800 space multi-storey car park there to replace the parking being lost when the plans for the Millennium Park came to fruition.

My opposition to this was on many fronts so armed with my objections, I attended the hustings and raised my concerns to the candidates standing for Deputy in the St Helier No 2 district.

Rod Bryans was one of those candidates standing who, along with the other candidates disagreed with the proposed plans however, it was Rod Bryans who took the time the next day to find my contact details and call me in respect of my concerns and the advice he gave me that stands in my mind was for me to find like minded people who also had concerns and to pull together in numbers to make our voice heard.

Despite Rod being narrowly beaten in the 2008 elections, he kept in contact with me making suggestions of people to contact who might support my cause but his underlying message was to unite with others.  It was Rod who gave me the confidence to contact residents in the area and put together a petition objecting to the planned multi-storey car park.

Rod would pop by as I was stood in Queen Street on Saturdays in all sorts of weather encouraging me to look back on how much I had achieved by obtaining support of both residents and Deputies, to fight for the cause.  On many occasions Rod was there in the background encouraging me, even when I got down heartened, to persevere.

The outcome was to lodge a 2,588 signature petition to the States of Jersey against the building of a multi-storey car park at Ann Court in November 2009 and in March 2010, the States of Jersey agreed not to pursue the building of a multi-storey car park on the site.

Whilst I had the support of residents and Deputies, I still look back with immense gratitude to Rod for taking the time to picking up the telephone after the hustings in 2008 and encouraging me to take those first steps to fight for what I believed.

Thank you and well done to both of them.

I received this email from Paul De Gruchy today and thought it was worth sharing.

In 2008 the UK’s Public Administration Select Committee (PASC) were asked to set out the requirements for a good government. They came up with five prerequisites.

1. Good people: the need to recruit and cultivate people with the right skills and abilities to undertake the work of government effectively

2. Good process: appropriate structures, systems and procedures in place to develop and implement policies successfully

3. Good accountability: adequate arrangements for holding both elected and appointed officials to account for their decisions and actions

4. Good performance: effective performance assessment to identify how well government is meeting its objectives and where it could improve

5. Good standards: high ethical standards exhibited by people in public life, underpinned by robust ethical regulation and strong ethical leadership

These are five good measurements to consider when looking at your candidates for this election.

Further questions to consider when picking your candidates… How do they measure up? Can they deliver? Will they make this new government stronger? Will they represent your views?

Below are further recommendations again there are resonances for this island. The highlights are mine.

•  Encouraging a tighter, clearer focus in government, which might for example involve reducing the number of government ministers;
•  Greater focus on achieving good standards of basic administration, as opposed to responding to media and political pressures to take new initiatives or introduce new laws;
•  Ensuring that civil service recruitment and promotion processes emphasise the development of operational and delivery skills among civil servants as much as policy advice skills
•  Decentralising power wherever possible, in order to empower frontline public service workers and citizens and to ensure that decisions are made at the most appropriate level;
•  Promoting more thorough and considered processes for making policies and laws, including effective parliamentary pre- and post-legislative scrutiny;
•  Greater clarity about the roles and responsibilities of ministers and civil servants, so that accountability at the highest levels of government is well-defined and understood;
•  Co-ordinating the work of government so that the right balance is struck between having an effective corporate centre and allowing departments sufficient autonomy to operate successfully;
•  Establishing an independent body with the powers to assess and promote effective performance in government, ideally by changing the remit and operation of the National Audit Office; and
•  Fostering strong ethical leadership to promote high standards in public life, as well as transparent, independent and accountable ethical regulation.

Today I took the opportunity to vote before the day of the election.

You simply get down to St Paul’s Centre between New Street and Romerils. Once inside you tell the staff what parish you belong to and then show your ID ( passport or driving licence ). They will ask whether you are voting for Senators, Deputies or Constables and provide you with the appropriate voting slips.

You can then vote in a private booth putting the slip in an envelope and handing it back sealed to one of the staff. Job done. Great idea.

Pre-Poll Voting

What is pre-poll voting?

Election day is 19th October 2011, at Springfield for St Helier 2 voters, but any voter may vote in advance of Election Day if they want to.

To do this, voters should go to St. Paul’s Gate, New Street, St Helier to cast their vote. This facility starts this Monday 19^th September 2011, and is open between 10am and 4.30pm, (Monday to Friday) and finishes at 2pm on Monday 17^th October 2011.

What will I need?

You will need photographic identification, such as a driving licence or a passport or I.D. card. As you will be voting in a different place from the polling station in your Parish, there is no possibility that you can be recognised by Parish staff as the pre-poll vote will be staffed by employees of the Judicial Greffe.

Who can pre-poll vote?

Any registered elector can. You do not need a reason for doing so. You can live in any Parish. In addition, the Judicial Greffier will arrange for a registered elector who is ill, disabled or illiterate to pre-poll vote, in another location if necessary.

You can also pre-poll vote if you have registered to vote, but your name and address have been deliberately omitted from the electoral register because there is a risk or threat of harm to you.

Is this different from voting on the day?

Yes. You will be given a ballot paper for each election you want to vote in (one each for the election for Senators, Connétable and Deputy. You are not obliged to vote in every election) You will be given an envelope to put your ballot paper or papers in after you have voted. You will hand this envelope to staff and they will make sure your vote or votes are sent to the correct electoral district.

Timetable

Pre-poll voting opens on Monday 19^th September 2011 at 10am, and closes at 2pm on Monday 17^th October 2011.

What if I vote only in one of the elections, eg Senators’ election, and decide later that I want to vote for the Connetable and/or for the Deputy?

Provided you made it clear to the staff when you went to pre-poll vote that you only wanted to vote for Senators, you can return to pre-poll vote for the Connetable or Deputy, or you can attend your polling station on Election Day and vote for the remaining categories of member.

The above was taken from the vote.je website.

Here is a recently published report highlighting two major concerns relating to children in affluent societies. UNICEF Report.

The BBC reported “A report by Unicef has concluded that British children are among the least happy in the developed world.

The reason, according to the charity, is a lack of contact with parents and too much emphasis on material gain.”

A disassociation between parents and children and the desperate desire to give children everything thing they want. This is a real problem in Jersey.

Last night at the IOD debate about Public Private Partnerships a young girl called Emma,a very articulate student from Beaulieu, asked “why are students pushed down the route of Universities being the only real offer for further Education? Why is not more emphasis and funds placed on Highlands?”

Senator Cohen’s reply was that he and Senator Ozouf had witnessed a similar model in Malta and thought it a good thing. It was a night of political platitudes. Models? Malta?

Emma’s question and the answer she got, crystallised one of the stark problems we have here. Politicians are not listening to their own people.

Right here right now we have some of the brightest minds in generations. Emma asked the best question of the night and should have got the best answer not pre-election political posturing.

At the last election in 2008 members of the JDA broke the law and tampered with the postal votes. Geoff Southern and Shona Pitman were charged with the offenses, pleaded guilty and subsequently fined. They then created a smokescreen story of an infringement of Human Rights.(Whatever happened to that story?) I have no doubt that some people may have found it difficult to vote and genuinely would have needed help but help was offered by the town hall and the number of postal votes called into question was nearly 80. 30 before the law came in and 50 after.

They tried to put themselves above the law and got caught. What they did was unacceptable and then they tried to make it sound acceptable. No one was convinced.

And yet they remained members of our government. Caught, convicted, fined.

Since then what have they done?  The JDA has disappeared like so many of their manifesto promises. Here’s a classic…”We will get rid of GST”. They had a plan but not one they shared. It didn’t happen GST is still here and now higher.

Who were the JDA? Ted Vibert, Geoff Southern, Shona Pitman, Trevor Pitman and Debbie De Sousa. Now all standing as independents.

We can’t let this kind of thing continue. I want to stand to offer the residents of St Helier District 2 the opportunity to have a different kind of politician.Someone who believes the electorate needs to be listened to and helped.

We all deserve something a lot better. Someone that will listen to them and try to make their lives better.

Someone that understands them, the hardships they are suffering and will get involved to find solutions. I’m a problem solver with a proven track record of working with people, of making things happen.

I was working at The Bridge on Sunday and a local dad said ” I voted for the JDA but I won’t this time because they haven’t done anything. They don’t keep their promises.” They didn’t represent his views and they don’t represent mine.

I live in the district and have done for 11 years. They don’t. Do they have a vested interest in looking after your problems? I don’t think so.

You have four sitting politicians that don’t seem to have accomplished much. It is time for some new blood.

Good politicians can have a profound effect on peoples lives. I believe I have the potential for a good politician.

As I said in the title It’s time to stop, think and vote.