Does your neighbour have a petrol bomb or two under the bed; maybe even a rocket launcher? A few crates of old Nazi stick grenades left over from the Occupation perhaps? Has he or she already admitted wanting to kill you; maybe even already attacked your home?
Not nice things to consider for sure. But in the event of such information coming to light then – like me – you would probably think it only commonsense for the Police to advise you and your family about the potential danger you were in? Just so you could take any additional precautions and the like.
But you would be wrong.
Home Affairs Minister, Senator Ian Le Marquand says you have “no right to know whatsoever” because it would be a “breach of your neighbour’s Human Rights!” Oh yes, and that bolshie Deputy Trevor Pitman really should stop “exaggerating” about such things -.blooming scaremonger! Apparently I had even upset the gun clubs – even though my question had not once mentioned them or even…GUNS period!
IF YOU WANT THE REAL FACTS GO ON TO CITIZENS’ MEDIA
As if it isn’t already worrying enough to learn that journalists within the Island’s ‘professional Accredited Media’ appear to think that you spell ‘bomb’ with a ‘G’,‘U’ and an ‘N’ Senator Ian Le Marquand’s latest performance in the States should have everyone supporting the introduction of a ‘recall’ mechanism into local election law as a matter of urgency.
Okay, so after the shambolic farce that was the Minister’s handling of the suspension of former Chief of Police, Graham Power (when he ran away from a fair fight that would have been a full disciplinary hearing) you likely wouldn’t be expecting too much to be fair. But surely a modicum of commonsense might be applied in an instance like this – after all these are potentially matters of life and death we are talking about?
But no – not a bit of it! Just as we have seen with the attitude from our Establishment Party to the victims of abuse at Haut De La Garenne these past few years; the rights of victims count for nothing when set against that of perpetrators. Indeed, Senator Le Marquand was once again about as much use to vulnerable people as a chocolate teapot
So do we give up? Hardly – I actually have a lot more information on this matter than I am currently putting forth. Come next Tuesday I will be giving the Attorney General his chance to tell us his version of just what the heck has gone wrong here. Just as importantly, hopefully give people like my constituent Tony and his poor family a bit of reassurance …
Not nice things to consider for sure. But in the event of such information coming to light then – like me – you would probably think it only commonsense for the Police to advise you and your family about the potential danger you were in? Just so you could take any additional precautions and the like.
But you would be wrong.
Home Affairs Minister, Senator Ian Le Marquand says you have “no right to know whatsoever” because it would be a “breach of your neighbour’s Human Rights!” Oh yes, and that bolshie Deputy Trevor Pitman really should stop “exaggerating” about such things -.blooming scaremonger! Apparently I had even upset the gun clubs – even though my question had not once mentioned them or even…GUNS period!
IF YOU WANT THE REAL FACTS GO ON TO CITIZENS’ MEDIA
As if it isn’t already worrying enough to learn that journalists within the Island’s ‘professional Accredited Media’ appear to think that you spell ‘bomb’ with a ‘G’,‘U’ and an ‘N’ Senator Ian Le Marquand’s latest performance in the States should have everyone supporting the introduction of a ‘recall’ mechanism into local election law as a matter of urgency.
Okay, so after the shambolic farce that was the Minister’s handling of the suspension of former Chief of Police, Graham Power (when he ran away from a fair fight that would have been a full disciplinary hearing) you likely wouldn’t be expecting too much to be fair. But surely a modicum of commonsense might be applied in an instance like this – after all these are potentially matters of life and death we are talking about?
But no – not a bit of it! Just as we have seen with the attitude from our Establishment Party to the victims of abuse at Haut De La Garenne these past few years; the rights of victims count for nothing when set against that of perpetrators. Indeed, Senator Le Marquand was once again about as much use to vulnerable people as a chocolate teapot
So do we give up? Hardly – I actually have a lot more information on this matter than I am currently putting forth. Come next Tuesday I will be giving the Attorney General his chance to tell us his version of just what the heck has gone wrong here. Just as importantly, hopefully give people like my constituent Tony and his poor family a bit of reassurance …
Meanwhile, for the full details of an incredible story that has NOTHING to do with seeking more restrictions on responsible members of shooting clubs and the like please do visit www.voiceforchildren.blogspot.com. or watch Tony tell it in his own words - see below. If you are not disgusted your name is probably Jon. Or Ian…
IS THERE HOPE THAT REALITY IS FINALLY SINKING IN AT THE TREASURY DEPARTMENT?
Having been hammering home the proven reality that giving multi-millionaires undeserved preferential tax breaks doesn’t automatically then make the ‘economic pie’ bigger for all of us for the last 18 months I am pleased –if admittedly surprised – that finally the Treasury Minister might be taking the blinkers off. I stress ‘might’…
Though admitting to me that he had still not got around to reading the economist that all discredited ‘free-market’ Capitalists should read – Ha-Joon Chang – in conversation Senator Ozouf did confirm that the Treasury are now finally beginning to look at putting proper regulations in place: i.e. that would enforce new 1 (1) K residents needing to commit a set and realistic amount of income to investment in the Island.
This is the only way; of course, that the much-spun and largely mythic ‘trickle down’ benefit to other people can ever have any significant degree of guaranteed impact. Will Senator Ozouf actually follow this through? Let’s hope so. Indeed, if he does I’ll even promise to give him full credit and not make one of those annoying ‘I’ve been telling you to do this for years!’ speeches.
WHAT DIFFERENCE DO A FEW MILES OF WATER MAKE?
Not a lot you might think. But if we’re talking legal advice to the governments of Jersey and Guernsey in regard to the challenge to the UK’s LVCR ruling you actually couldn’t be more wrong according to my genuinely good friend, Deputy Mike Higgins. About £360,000 cost to us and only £60,000 to them!
Think about it. The same issue which means pretty much the same type of questions needing to be answered. Not to mention a similar amount of work and research to be done. Yet we are being charged six times as much!
Of course, the fact that Economic Development Minister Senator Alan Maclean says that he is “quite happy” with the charge will ensure that these concerns go no further in terms of the Executive. For those of us who live in the real world, however, the next question is to request a breakdown of exactly what this is buying us – and then comparing it with our counterparts in Guernsey.
There can, after all, be only two conclusions. Somebody is getting very good value for money. Or somebody is getting badly ripped off! Either way the Islands’ taxpayers deserve to know about it.
Having been hammering home the proven reality that giving multi-millionaires undeserved preferential tax breaks doesn’t automatically then make the ‘economic pie’ bigger for all of us for the last 18 months I am pleased –if admittedly surprised – that finally the Treasury Minister might be taking the blinkers off. I stress ‘might’…
Though admitting to me that he had still not got around to reading the economist that all discredited ‘free-market’ Capitalists should read – Ha-Joon Chang – in conversation Senator Ozouf did confirm that the Treasury are now finally beginning to look at putting proper regulations in place: i.e. that would enforce new 1 (1) K residents needing to commit a set and realistic amount of income to investment in the Island.
This is the only way; of course, that the much-spun and largely mythic ‘trickle down’ benefit to other people can ever have any significant degree of guaranteed impact. Will Senator Ozouf actually follow this through? Let’s hope so. Indeed, if he does I’ll even promise to give him full credit and not make one of those annoying ‘I’ve been telling you to do this for years!’ speeches.
WHAT DIFFERENCE DO A FEW MILES OF WATER MAKE?
Not a lot you might think. But if we’re talking legal advice to the governments of Jersey and Guernsey in regard to the challenge to the UK’s LVCR ruling you actually couldn’t be more wrong according to my genuinely good friend, Deputy Mike Higgins. About £360,000 cost to us and only £60,000 to them!
Think about it. The same issue which means pretty much the same type of questions needing to be answered. Not to mention a similar amount of work and research to be done. Yet we are being charged six times as much!
Of course, the fact that Economic Development Minister Senator Alan Maclean says that he is “quite happy” with the charge will ensure that these concerns go no further in terms of the Executive. For those of us who live in the real world, however, the next question is to request a breakdown of exactly what this is buying us – and then comparing it with our counterparts in Guernsey.
There can, after all, be only two conclusions. Somebody is getting very good value for money. Or somebody is getting badly ripped off! Either way the Islands’ taxpayers deserve to know about it.
SHOULDN’T A ‘POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT’ ACTUALLY KNOW SOMETHING ABOUT POLITICS?
Isn’t it the way it always happens? You are one of those who actually understand that for a community to really flourish long-term government has to work for ALL in society – not just for the benefit of the rich.
So you understandably breath a big sigh of relief that one of the local media ‘Tory Boys’ has apparently given up writing gushing nonsense praising any local politician to the right of Maggie Thatcher (or the slightly more socially-aware orientated Genghis Khan). Moved on instead to apparently reminisce about his secret love for 80’s Brit-Pop band Blur,
And then, whilst you’re cutting up Monday’s JEP to put it into the smallest room in the house for safe-keeping you are stunned to notice that this apparently was nothing more than a pleasant dream! Yes, that’s right. My old friend Ben Quérée (quite a nice bloke for a Chelsea supporter!) is spouting lyrical on behalf of the Establishment Party yet again! Not only that but what he is writing is about as accurate as the shooting of £50 million pound, one-goal-a-year flop striker Fernando Torres.
Yup! Not content with last week’s ‘The Fly’ column where I was described as asking ‘silly’ questions about a mere ‘dispute between neighbours’ (see the petrol bomb story for how insulting this must have been to my terrified constituents) now old Ben is trying to shift the blame for the likely sabotaging of the Electoral Commission on to the ‘left-leaning opposition’ in the States!
You really might have thought that barely four months on the JEP would have been quite content to have gotten away with giving far more slant, focus and space to supporting the regularly incoherent political ramblings of Senator Philip Bailhache during the election than was afforded to others standing? Yet apparently not if you read Ben’s latest offering.
No. Senator Bailhache now attempting to hijack the long-agreed, fully independent Electoral Commission to try and ensure the role of the Constables is a non-negotiable; not to mention Senator Ian Gorst doing a good impression of a forked-tongued Hissing Sid in going back on his stated pre-Chief Minister election vote commitment to this were apparently wholly irrelevant.
The real villains it seems – at least according to Ben’s deep and obviously unbiased ‘political’ analysis is that it now ‘gives the left-leaning opposition (I think you mean democrats, Ben) an excuse to back out of any reforms that don’t suit them’. Something which apparently comes close to ‘defeating the point of the whole Commission!’
Well, thanks for clarifying that one for us, Ben! I must confess I had completely missed it. As apparently had every other person that I have spoken to! There was us – even that old radical Deputy Roy le Herissier - foolishly all getting agitated over one man putting what he wants ahead of the interests of the ordinary people who made this Island the success it has been. Really, where do we all get it from?
You know at this point I must admit I was quite tempted to write something a bit cutting about my good friend, Ben. But then I mellowed a bit. After all, I thought, given that there is now about as much likelihood of his once dominant football team winning any silverware this year as there is of Senator Bailhache still being in politics in a year’s time if his attempt to hijack democracy is unsuccessful, poor old Ben has probably suffered enough!
Isn’t it the way it always happens? You are one of those who actually understand that for a community to really flourish long-term government has to work for ALL in society – not just for the benefit of the rich.
So you understandably breath a big sigh of relief that one of the local media ‘Tory Boys’ has apparently given up writing gushing nonsense praising any local politician to the right of Maggie Thatcher (or the slightly more socially-aware orientated Genghis Khan). Moved on instead to apparently reminisce about his secret love for 80’s Brit-Pop band Blur,
And then, whilst you’re cutting up Monday’s JEP to put it into the smallest room in the house for safe-keeping you are stunned to notice that this apparently was nothing more than a pleasant dream! Yes, that’s right. My old friend Ben Quérée (quite a nice bloke for a Chelsea supporter!) is spouting lyrical on behalf of the Establishment Party yet again! Not only that but what he is writing is about as accurate as the shooting of £50 million pound, one-goal-a-year flop striker Fernando Torres.
Yup! Not content with last week’s ‘The Fly’ column where I was described as asking ‘silly’ questions about a mere ‘dispute between neighbours’ (see the petrol bomb story for how insulting this must have been to my terrified constituents) now old Ben is trying to shift the blame for the likely sabotaging of the Electoral Commission on to the ‘left-leaning opposition’ in the States!
You really might have thought that barely four months on the JEP would have been quite content to have gotten away with giving far more slant, focus and space to supporting the regularly incoherent political ramblings of Senator Philip Bailhache during the election than was afforded to others standing? Yet apparently not if you read Ben’s latest offering.
No. Senator Bailhache now attempting to hijack the long-agreed, fully independent Electoral Commission to try and ensure the role of the Constables is a non-negotiable; not to mention Senator Ian Gorst doing a good impression of a forked-tongued Hissing Sid in going back on his stated pre-Chief Minister election vote commitment to this were apparently wholly irrelevant.
The real villains it seems – at least according to Ben’s deep and obviously unbiased ‘political’ analysis is that it now ‘gives the left-leaning opposition (I think you mean democrats, Ben) an excuse to back out of any reforms that don’t suit them’. Something which apparently comes close to ‘defeating the point of the whole Commission!’
Well, thanks for clarifying that one for us, Ben! I must confess I had completely missed it. As apparently had every other person that I have spoken to! There was us – even that old radical Deputy Roy le Herissier - foolishly all getting agitated over one man putting what he wants ahead of the interests of the ordinary people who made this Island the success it has been. Really, where do we all get it from?
You know at this point I must admit I was quite tempted to write something a bit cutting about my good friend, Ben. But then I mellowed a bit. After all, I thought, given that there is now about as much likelihood of his once dominant football team winning any silverware this year as there is of Senator Bailhache still being in politics in a year’s time if his attempt to hijack democracy is unsuccessful, poor old Ben has probably suffered enough!
I just hope he has a holiday booked if his latest hero doesn’t get his way…
Keep the Faith
Trevor
