Letter to the Editor: What Islanders really need is a Liberty for Jersey party

I AM writing in response to the letter from John Henwood (JEP 16 October). I find it encouraging that the debate on the role and nature of our government has been initiated by Mr Henwood and I am broadly supportive of his sentiment and views.

It is self-evident that if the government seeks to remove a significant proportion of the disposable income from the population then the amount of money available to spend is reduced. Our government has systematically increased the effective rate of taxation from around 20% in 1980 to somewhere in the region of 45% today. It is no surprise, therefore, that our economy is faltering.

Increased regulation has hammered much of Jersey’s industry – first making the tourism industry non-viable and lately rendering the finance industry non-competitive as the cost of complying with an ever increasing bureaucratic burden has escalated exponentially. This started in 1998 with the insistence that all corporate entities prepare accounts. Regulation is also making retail a non-starter, except for small businesses with no employees, due to the costs and risks associated with employing someone.

Jersey’s reputation as a tax haven arises solely as a consequence of government policy. Other low tax jurisdictions are not seen as ‘tax havens’ for the simple reason that they never applied differing tax rules to residents and non-residents. Jersey for some reason chose to discriminate against Jersey people and then fought to defend their right to discriminate against us.

At this juncture we should remember that the States of Jersey is a trust. The beneficiaries of that trust are the public of the Island of Jersey but our representatives, whom we elect to represent our interests with the bureaucracy, do not often seem to satisfactorily execute these responsibilities. Too often they set the concerns of the bureaucracy ahead of the concerns of the people.

Our interest is to be left enough money upon which to live. Under the current system too often the government takes so much money that people are forced to beg for their own money back. Our interest is to be left to govern ourselves. We are more capable than any bureaucrat of making decisions affecting our own lives and those of our families.

Government cannot offer any solutions because government is the problem. It is not a ‘taxed enough already’ party that is required but a Liberty for Jersey party – a party which would seek independence, for the people of Jersey, from the States of Jersey and bring an end to the discrimination that Jersey people suffer daily at the hands of their own government.

It is time to abolish our current form of government and replace it with that which seems most likely to us, to ensure our right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

[JEP Archive]

The unanimous Declaration of the twelve Parishes of Jersey

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. 

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Parishes; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present States of Jersey is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these Parishes. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

• For abolishing the free System of Common Law, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, so as to render it an instrument for introducing absolute rule into these Parishes:
• For altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
• For combining with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; gaining Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
• They have made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
• For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
• For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
• They are at this time transporting large Armies of foreign workers to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Government of a civilized nation.
• They have erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
• For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Crimes which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these Parishes:

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A legislature whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the government of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Trustees. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Public of the united Parishes of Jersey, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Parishes, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Parishes are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent Parishes; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the States of Jersey, and that all political connection between them and the States of Jersey, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent Parishes, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent Parishes may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Politicians, Lawyers, Policemen & Civil Servants. I LOVE YOU!

The 3rd October 2013 was Gandhi's birthday, a day when we celebrate international non-violence day.

I like to take a pause and consider the wisdom of one of my chief inspirations, the enlightened soul that is Gandhi.

It is easy in the modern world to confuse the basis of personal wealth; the love of money is the root of all evil but it is in the love that you are given freely by your fellow human beings that your true worth is correctly estimated.

The most important and most difficult human to love is yourself; and how much more difficult when you place yourself in a position of authority over other humans. When humans places their trust, safety and security in you.

This is an onerous task and one that should not be accepted lightly. Perhaps a task that is accepted without sufficient consideration for the consequences and overbearing weight of such a burden.

I do not expect you to be perfect so:

Every time you make a self-serving decision, every bribe you accept, every skull broken beneath your batons and bullets; I want you to know that I forgive you.

Every time you take pleasure in causing someone else pain, every time you cover up the actions of your fellows, every time you interpret the law to serve the cause of oppression rather than cause of justice; I want you to know that I know you are human and that there is good in you.

Forgive yourself, let go of the pain, but do not forget. In every moment, remember, you are in control of yourself and have a choice; you can change yourself, you can continue to grow and evolve, you can be true to to yourself. I will be persistent in my encouragement for you to do that.

I love myself too much to allow resentment, fear, hatred or anger to interfere with that self-love. I know my true worth and I wish you could know what that feels like.

Who am I to say these things? I am one who is grateful to you for taking on such a burden. I am your equal and I love you.