THE JERSEY MEDIA - both the JEP and BBC Radio - have given a huge amount of space to a recent visit to Jersey by a Shrewsbury MP and his views about what a wonderful place Jersey is and how he is going to try and persuade Mr. Cameron, the British Prime Minister to visit the island and see his concept of The Big Society in action. Don’t hold your breath!
Let’s get this straight. The fawning Jersey media gave the impression to the Jersey people that this British politician was someone of significance in British political life. The JEP said that he was a junior minister of agriculture and “chaired two committees on relationships with the Arab world.”.
Sounds impressive - until you do a bit of research into the man. This research shows that he is a political lightweight. He is not a junior Minister of Agriculture. He is merely a parliamentary private secretary to a junior Minister of Agriculture which is as far removed from the power base of politics in the UK as a milk monitor is from the headmaster.
How come he was in Jersey? Well, there’s an election coming up isn’t there. And although Ozouf and McClean are not up for election, they are backing a number of candidates to bolster their influence within the States..
So enter Ozouf’s great admirer, Freddie Cohen - the MP was brought here by the amiable Senator Freddie Cohen as a sort of trophy. His gaggle of political friends led by Philip Ozouf are desperately worried about the forthcoming elections and the likely election of some serious opposition to them and the possible foiling of Ozouf’s Chief Ministerial ambitions.
They need someone to say how good Jersey is so they bring political non-entities to Jersey, give them a good time, wine him and dine him, let him be brainwashed by the spin masters at Jersey Finance, take him to meet officials of the Jersey Financial Commission and send him home with a pot of black butter, a bottle of la Mare wine and a silver Jersey milk can singing the praises of Jersey.
He was impressed by everything about the island. He told the JEP that “this is an extremely tidy and safe place. It has all the attributes of the sort of community that we all want to live in and I think that the UK can learn from that”.
This is the one thing he said that I agree with. It is a lovely place to live if you have money. And it is an argument I have been putting as to why our wealthy workers (lawyers, accountants, finance workers at high levels and top level public servants who would never leave Jersey if we were to put their tax up slightly to help pay for what less well-off residents require to make their lives more tolerable.
Of course, what Jersey Finance and Freddie Cohen want him to say is that Jersey makes a huge contribution to the UK by pumping money - most of it gained through tax avoidance schemes - into the City of London. He is reported in the JEP as saying: “I am staggered by the amount of support that the City of London has had from Jersey, the massive liquidity that is pumped into London as a result of Jersey’s offshore status and the work that you do here. Not enough is known in the UK about the hugely important financial benefits that we get from Jersey”
If he starts peddling this kind of nonsense around Westminster, he is likely to get very short shrift from colleagues. They will point out to him that much of the money coming into Jersey comes from tax avoidance schemes from around the world, some of it from their own country. They will also point out that if the British taxpayer hadn’t bailed out HBOS-Lloyds, Royal Bank of Scotland, Northern Rock and others, the Jersey finance industry would have collapsed.
Some of them will also point out that the head of Revenue and Customs told a recent House of Lords Select Committee that Jersey tax information exchange agreements were not transparent and that they found it impossible to get information from Jersey authorities. Others will tell him that moves are afoot to curb the Jersey fulfilment industry which is damaging British High Street shops.
We are also in conflict with the UK Treasury over our Zero Ten tax regime which has been declared non-compliant by the European Union.
If Freddie Cohen is keen on visiting political lightweights coming to Jersey to see what we are all about he should make sure that anyone like this insignificant MP knows that we have1400 people unemployed (40% of them under 21), house prices as expensive as in London, making it impossible for young people to ever own their own home, no anti-discrimination legislation, a government system where the chief judge (Bailiff) is also the president of the States, where legal fees are the most expensive in Britain. Visiting politicians should be allowed to visit Age Concern and talk to Mrs. Minihane about how the elderly are struggling to make ends meet with food prices 30% higher than in the UK with GST on food pushing the cost even higher.
These visitors need to be told that the cost of paying rent, feeding a family, and transporting them is 60% higher her than in the UK.
This will soon turn their rose-tinted spectacles a dark shade of grey.
Let’s get this straight. The fawning Jersey media gave the impression to the Jersey people that this British politician was someone of significance in British political life. The JEP said that he was a junior minister of agriculture and “chaired two committees on relationships with the Arab world.”.
Sounds impressive - until you do a bit of research into the man. This research shows that he is a political lightweight. He is not a junior Minister of Agriculture. He is merely a parliamentary private secretary to a junior Minister of Agriculture which is as far removed from the power base of politics in the UK as a milk monitor is from the headmaster.
How come he was in Jersey? Well, there’s an election coming up isn’t there. And although Ozouf and McClean are not up for election, they are backing a number of candidates to bolster their influence within the States..
So enter Ozouf’s great admirer, Freddie Cohen - the MP was brought here by the amiable Senator Freddie Cohen as a sort of trophy. His gaggle of political friends led by Philip Ozouf are desperately worried about the forthcoming elections and the likely election of some serious opposition to them and the possible foiling of Ozouf’s Chief Ministerial ambitions.
They need someone to say how good Jersey is so they bring political non-entities to Jersey, give them a good time, wine him and dine him, let him be brainwashed by the spin masters at Jersey Finance, take him to meet officials of the Jersey Financial Commission and send him home with a pot of black butter, a bottle of la Mare wine and a silver Jersey milk can singing the praises of Jersey.
He was impressed by everything about the island. He told the JEP that “this is an extremely tidy and safe place. It has all the attributes of the sort of community that we all want to live in and I think that the UK can learn from that”.
This is the one thing he said that I agree with. It is a lovely place to live if you have money. And it is an argument I have been putting as to why our wealthy workers (lawyers, accountants, finance workers at high levels and top level public servants who would never leave Jersey if we were to put their tax up slightly to help pay for what less well-off residents require to make their lives more tolerable.
Of course, what Jersey Finance and Freddie Cohen want him to say is that Jersey makes a huge contribution to the UK by pumping money - most of it gained through tax avoidance schemes - into the City of London. He is reported in the JEP as saying: “I am staggered by the amount of support that the City of London has had from Jersey, the massive liquidity that is pumped into London as a result of Jersey’s offshore status and the work that you do here. Not enough is known in the UK about the hugely important financial benefits that we get from Jersey”
If he starts peddling this kind of nonsense around Westminster, he is likely to get very short shrift from colleagues. They will point out to him that much of the money coming into Jersey comes from tax avoidance schemes from around the world, some of it from their own country. They will also point out that if the British taxpayer hadn’t bailed out HBOS-Lloyds, Royal Bank of Scotland, Northern Rock and others, the Jersey finance industry would have collapsed.
Some of them will also point out that the head of Revenue and Customs told a recent House of Lords Select Committee that Jersey tax information exchange agreements were not transparent and that they found it impossible to get information from Jersey authorities. Others will tell him that moves are afoot to curb the Jersey fulfilment industry which is damaging British High Street shops.
We are also in conflict with the UK Treasury over our Zero Ten tax regime which has been declared non-compliant by the European Union.
If Freddie Cohen is keen on visiting political lightweights coming to Jersey to see what we are all about he should make sure that anyone like this insignificant MP knows that we have1400 people unemployed (40% of them under 21), house prices as expensive as in London, making it impossible for young people to ever own their own home, no anti-discrimination legislation, a government system where the chief judge (Bailiff) is also the president of the States, where legal fees are the most expensive in Britain. Visiting politicians should be allowed to visit Age Concern and talk to Mrs. Minihane about how the elderly are struggling to make ends meet with food prices 30% higher than in the UK with GST on food pushing the cost even higher.
These visitors need to be told that the cost of paying rent, feeding a family, and transporting them is 60% higher her than in the UK.
This will soon turn their rose-tinted spectacles a dark shade of grey.
Now you are not standing for senator, are you changing your position given on a comment to a previous posting that you are telling people to only vote for you? As far as I can see the only worthwhile votes are, in order of preference Syvret, Forskitt and at a push Le Gresley.
ReplyDeleteYou might like to take a look at this part of Mr Kawczynski's parliamentary track record:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.mattwardman.com/blog/2009/01/22/daniel-kawczynski-the-tallest-plonker-in-parliament-by-garbo/
As you'll see the police asked him for some constituency correspondence to compare handwriting with threatening letters sent to various people. Kawczynski acceded to the request, but then got all uppity about it when the storm over confidentiality broke.
Perhaps he needs to hear the story of the Syvret raid?
No - in the deputy elections I am suggesting that people study the voting patterns on issues such as the introduction of GST;the increase in GST to 5%; the maintenance of GST on food and the removal of free school milk and decide if they are the kind of people they want representing them and only vote for them if they know their political achievements.
ReplyDeleteThe Senators: I will only be voting for Stuart and Francis Le Gresley..
It is obvious that the man is a total plonker and of no value to Jersey whatsoever. I'm sure he had a nice time at our expense in Jersey. Must find out if we paid his expenses whilst he was here
ReplyDeleteHave you ever asked yourself why Sen MacLean's departments activities are never fully examined?
ReplyDeletethis lack of thorough oversight is disgraceful whilst:
- tourism is woefully under-funded whilst finance giveaways / grants are increased
- jersey enterprise is a scandal that will be covered up in the merger with Business Ventures (what is done to track grants - nothing)
- endless funding with no tangible results to skills jersey
- lifeguard signage farce
- firework disgrace
- what is going on with the lottery?
- what is all the money spent on supposedly attracting the wealthy? lavish dinners and pointless travel
what would you do if elected?
why are none of the current members asking questions?
Rome is burning while they are on holiday.
Jimmy
Jimmy you must be a mind reader I have just completed my election manifesto and one of my pledges is that I will do my best to have the Economic Development Department scrapped. Its a complete 3 million waste of public money- another layer of highly paid public servants that achieves nothing. Not only is Jersey Enterprise a scandal but the way the Airport handled the new control system for the control tower is another example of total incompetence that has cost the island £800,000 plus.
ReplyDelete