Election Result

So, Francis Le Gresley romped home, followed by Stuart Syvret, Patrick Ryan and myself.

Congratulations to Francis – he’s such a nice man.
However, he is quite unsuitable as a States member. He’s too nice – he’ll not be able to stand the personal attacks & abuse that comes with exposing corruption, wrong-doing, waste of taxpayers’ money, inappropriate decisions by the Council of Ministers etc.
So he’ll either disappear (like my replacement, Anne Dupre) or become a Council of Ministers lackey. In fact, for a newcomer, his campaign was a little too slick – not supported by the Council, by any chance???
He thinks he understands politics, but in reality he hasn’t a clue.

The reason I stood in the by-election was because I could see Jersey is at a financial crisis point and no-one in the States (or indeed among the other candidates) seemed to have a clue how to solve it.
There is only one way – reduce States expenditure by cutting from the top salaried staff – not the lower paid coal-face workers.
Let’s face it, remove two part -time cleaners might save perhaps £30,000 a year. Removing two non-accountable senior officers and you save £1/2 million plus. It’s a ‘no brainer’.

Instead, our Treasury Minister, Philip Ozouf, decides to cut front-line staff and raise taxes.

Francis Le Gresley’s only policy I could recognise was to raise Income Tax to 27% or more. In other words, more of the same, only worse.
Whereas before I was very concerned about the future of my Island, now I’m certain we’ll end up like Greece – only with no-one to bail us out. It’ll be back to the austerity of the days of the Occuption. I can only advise whoever has wealth in Jersey to liquidate it as soon as possible and move it out of Jersey before we become bankrupt.
And whose fault is it?
Not the politicians, but those idiots who elect them.

Don’t they realise Greece ended up in the mire - and are only avoiding revolution / bloodshed because EU countries are bailing them out (something not available to us) – because of its Socialist spend & tax policies?
And can’t our electorate recognise that Francis is as Socialist as they come?
Obviously not. Apparently being a ‘nice man’ is more important to them.
Had I won, questions would have been lodged ready for Tuesday 22nd – and a Proposition to start reducing public expenditure hopefully on the same day.
Maybe the public don’t realise there’s a background anti-Baudains campaign orchestrated by ministers. It’s done because I’m on their case – and effective – and they don’t like that. But they’ll love Francis the wimp!!

But what of the rest of the results?
Voters complain about our government, but continue to elect more of the same. Not only that, they are totally inconsistent.
They want change? Well, I was the one most likely to deliver - Stuart makes a fuss but doesn’t deliver, Geoff Southern has the balls but is actually in the same camp as Francis (leans so far to the left he’s in danger of falling over) whilst other ‘change’ candidates are too far down the viable list.

So what do the public do? they chose, in order of preference, status quo, change, status quo, change …..  which only goes to prove the public are not competent enough to select members of government. 

Running an election campaign is not only expensive – it also requires considerable effort to organise. For example, just to represent you at polling stations, you need to rota around 70 persons. 
Why should anyone bother to do that for such an unappreciative public?

And why would anyone want to put all that effort in merely to be insulted by the public? I have a record of honest hard work (and success) as a States member, frequently raising matters in the public interest that others were either unwilling (or incapable) of doing (the incinerator scandal and waterfront /Las Vegas law suit being just two examples).

So how do the voters reward my efforts (with a promise to continue that work for them)?
They elect a wimp to office, then proceed to put two more candidates ahead of me – Stuart, whose behaviour is a cause for concern (and achieves nothing) and Patrick who, apart from supporting the Council of Ministers, has likewise done nothing.
Even worse, the latter misled the electorate throughout the hustings by
1) saying he wanted to remove GST from food (in the full knowledge such a proposition had failed 4 times previously and therefore wasn’t going to happen)
2) not mentioning that he voted for GST in the first place,
3) supporting the Council of Ministers by saying zero / ten taxation complies with the EU Code (it certainly does not)
4) not saying he supported the Council in their quest for secret meetings (he was one of 14 who opposed my Proposition to open up those secret meetings) 
5) that although at a late stage in the hustings he added savings to his long, populist wish-list portrayed as ‘policy’ he nevertheless voted against achieving that in 2008 when I took a Proposition to do just that. I lost by one vote – had he supported me, by now we’d be well on our way to saving millions, thereby avoiding damaging tax increases.
His allegiance is towards the Council of Ministers, not the public, yet the public preferred him to me. And, as you can see from the above, he’s a past-master at misleading people.

Had I been narrowly beaten by Francis, I might have considered standing for election again.
For the voters to demonstrate their preference for Stuart and Patrick before me, makes my decision easy.
No chance. Not only wouldn’t I waste so much time and money again trying to persuade the electorate to vote for me, but why would anyone want to put up with the pressure, long hours, insults, lack of a private life etc working for people like that?
I repeat – the problem with Jersey’s government is not the people in it – it’s those idiots who vote them into office.
They don’t even have the gumption to see that some candidates are actually ‘planted’ (and supported) by the Council of Ministers to ensure ‘business as usual’ – There have been many examples in the past – and we’ve just had two in this election - but the public are too dim to understand what’s going on.
Instead of evaluating a candidate’s policies, they’re happy to be taken in by populist and meaningless propaganda masquerading as policy.

This by-election was probably the most important in the last 40 years – and the public fouled up in a big way.  On their decision rode the difference between Jersey surviving the present fiscal crisis - or entering financial ruin so bad that the Occupation will seem like a holiday in comparison.
They chose the latter.

I can only advise people to get out of Jersey while you can – thank you Francis and the Council of Ministers.

Postscript:   I’ve just heard that Francis intends doing nothing during this 16 month term except ‘learn the ropes’. Exactly as I said during the election campaign.
So, instead of having someone able to challenge the Council of Ministers during this crucial period (me), we have a wimp. Given Francis finishes his job as manager of CAB soon, perhaps he went for this job for the money? Who knows.  It’s certainly not because he understands politics.      
And his post-election JEP interview? He’s even more naiive than I thought. He states all States members only ask questions of the Council or lodge propositions to ‘prove they’re involved’. Arrogant arsehole.              
According to him, you only need to ask ministers and they’ll tell you everything!!!!!
What a prick!

And some ask why turnout is low & so many don’t vote. Is it any wonder?

 And finally  -  been reflecting (and discussing with the public) the way the public voted. Consensus is that the public are idiots and deserve what they get. Trouble is, what they get affects all of us – including those who understand what the Island needs.

And the problem is not unique to Jersey – just look at the UK – not only did the public put Labour back into office several times, they almost put it back again last time!   The country is on its knees facing huge cuts and tax rises – all thanks to Labour, not the recession – and the public wanted to take the country further down that road???  Either they’re mad, or actively working for some unknown entity that wishes to destroy the country.

So how do we resolve this?
Well, the public have proved themselves not sufficiently competent to elect governments. How else could it be done?
I’m suggesting candidates put themselves forward in the usual way, but are selected according to ability by an electoral college – rather like Jurats are presently elected.  
The college would be constituted by office, not personalities eg Connetables,  Jurats, Rectors etc.  At least then candidates would be selected according to ability, not whether they are ‘planted’, have a nice tie, know uncle Bert etc etc.

                                          ————————-