HUGE TURNOUT FOR GAY RIGHTS REFORM JERSEY EQUALITY PARADE

REFORM JERSEY - the spur to a revived democratic political system.

Today Reform Jersey was officially registered by the Royal Court as a political party; its name and logo will appear alongside the names of candidates at the October 15 general election.

 The reemergence of political parties was inevitable as they are at the very heart of democracy. Their absence for a decade and more is attributable to the weakness and disorganization of the island’s working people. This is hardly surprising. Jersey is a one party state and the name of that party is Finance.  The interest of Finance has captured the island economically and politically. With that objective reality we live and will navigate to develop politics that allow for the emergence and expression of the working people, so long divided and ignored.

We need to shatter the myth that there is no party politics in Jersey, and indeed any of the Channel Islands. There is no need for a political party to express the interests of capital and the Right since working people are divided and disorganized. There simply is no opposition in existence that poses sufficient threat to the hegemony of the Right that they need to be organised. They will continue to field “Independents”, masking the nature of class rule, for so long as that system functions.

The emergence of party politics, or at least the creation of an organised opposition on a modest scale, is attributable to the economic crisis of which this is Year VI. As I left the States Member’s offices in the Royal Square this evening, a number of members were discussing rumors of emerging deficits in the government budget that the current Treasury Minister is desperate to hide in advance of the October 15 election. The low tax low spend model is coming apart as the state seeks to find ever more revenue by taxing further wages and salaries to the advantage of capital. At some point there has to be an inevitable resistance by working people to the degradation of their lives. The creation of Reform Jersey is one sign of that resistance.

Even sections of Finance are sympathetic to the creation of party politics. They recognise that the present inchoate structure with its half-wit Constables and general amateurism is becoming a liability. They want to see the formation of party of the Right to represent their interests in a coherent manner. This can only be done if there is a spur and the success of Reform Jersey will be that agent.

Reform Jersey has a hard task ahead. To succeed it must break a thick layer of ignorance and indifference that has grown in the minds of working people, who have become deeply cynical about all possibility of change. With voter abstention at dangerously high levels the functioning of democracy is impaired and the rule of the one party state seemingly immovable. Yet we know from history that political regimes collapse with surprising rapidity in response to underlying long term structural fractures. How confident are our rulers and how well can we organise to challenge that rule? This the historic mission of Reform Jersey.

"POWER WITHOUT ACCOUNTABILITY" - REFORM JERSEY PUBLIC MEETING on Chief Minister's Powers - Town Hall Thursday 24th April, 7.30pm

Reform Jersey is holding a public meeting this Thursday evening in the Town Hall at 7.30 p.m. to discuss the implications for democracy in the island of the Chief Minister’s Proposition P33 creating a system of “ministerial responsibility”.

For Reform Jersey, P33 is simply a further concentration of power in the hands of a narrow and unrepresentative elite, in an Assembly that is already dangerously out of touch and unrepresentative.

It follows on from the earlier attempt to push the gerrymander of Option B through the States, having high-jacked the Electoral Commission and then sought to legitimate their chosen scheme with a Referendum that saw an abysmal 26% turnout. With long overdue electoral reform sabotaged, the forthcoming first general election once again leaves the electorate without policy choice or ability to structure the Assembly. High voter abstention will continue.

There are a number of proposed amendments to P33, none more audacious than that of the Treasury Minister, Senator Philip Ozouf, calling for salary increases for Ministers, ending existing egalitarian principles of remuneration and replacing it with a system of patronage, to the detriment of back benchers.

Reform Jersey will have members speaking and an invited guest with firsthand experience of the measures currently in place to prevent a concentration of power in the hands of a Chief Minister.

In this video interview recorded by Voiceforchildren, Reform Jersey members Deputy Sam Mezec and I, set out the reasons for calling the meeting.

REFORM JERSEY - A political party with ambition

Here is the exclusive interview given to Voiceforchildren blog following the election of Sam Mezec and I as Deputies in St Helier District No.1 and No.2 respectively on 5th March 2014.

In the interview we set out our vision of what the political party REFORM JERSEY might be. It will only be possible if the people of Jersey engage and rally to an organisation that has emblazoned on its banner Social Justice and Reform.

The real battle will come in the October 15 General Election - Jersey's first general election when all seats are open to be contested at the same time. The election will most likely be fought under the unreformed Constitution of 1948 with its three categories of States Member - Senator, Deputy and Constable. It’s going to be a messy affair, primarily because the political class has refused to embrace long overdue reforms and create a modern democratic electoral system. They have done so consciously because they fear losing power; they fear the people, who so far have been dulled into a-political indifference over many years.

Clearly this is an historic moment for the island of Jersey. At last the prospect of change is in sight and the agency of that change is REFORM JERSEY. I am honoured and thrilled to participate in this endeavor. Men make their own history but not in circumstances of their own choosing.

Thanks to VFC who has been tirelessly engaged and blogging for progressive politics since 2008.

At last we have a break-through and a brigehead established. The counter attack is sure to come and it will be met.