Election Odds and Ends
“Language can corrupt thought” (George Orwell)
Susie Pinel, in the St Clement’s Hustings came out with the remarkable revelation that there are no poor people in Jersey, just people on lower income. By the same token, there are no short people like me, but only people of lower height.
One of the worst traits, pointed out by George Orwell in his great essay “Politics and the English Language” is for politicians to use euphemistic language to define away unpalatable truths. It is clear that Deputy Pinel has picked up some of the less endearing traits of long-serving politicians.
Women in Politics
Garel Tucker is the latest woman standing in St Brelade No 2. Monty Tadier asked me who was the last woman to be elected as a Deputy in St Brelade No 2. You have to go quite a way back to Enid Quenaut who became Deputy in 1975 and retained the seat until she stood as Constable in 1987!
Election Posters or Election Poseurs?
Jason Lagadu’s large poster draped over a digger certainly attracted a lot of attention from my work colleagues, mainly that it was the most ridiculous thing they had seen in this election.
Apart from that some jollity was found over the poster announcing the Circus was coming to town, on the roundabout by the end of the tunnel, sitting neatly alongside a load of posters saying “Vote ...”. Alas, the joke was too much, and the offending banner was taken down, although some may think the announcement that “there will be clowns” is prophetic.
The cheapest poster is probably that of Stephen Ahier, which consists of a white laminated sheet of A4 with the words “Vote Ahier” in big black letters.
A number of candidates have gone for the dark professional background – Lyndon Farnham, Tracey Valois, Gordon Troy. I’m sure Lyndon’s hair has become a shade darker and less grey in his photo.
There are a lot less posters this time round, although as time has gone on, more have appeared overnight like some strange fungi - you could say they mushroomed! John Le Fondre's supporters must have been up half the night across the Island as there were lots, all at the regulation height in regulation places. The initial growth of Graham Truscotts saw a second wave about a week ago. Moz Scott started appearing everywhere. Even some Stevie Oceans turned up on a roundabout.
“Logic! said the Professor half to himself. Why don't they teach logic at these schools?” (C.S. Lewis)
John McNichol was probably the worst Reform candidate I have heard on Election Jersey. He said that the three sitting Deputies in St Helier No 1 had been part of the last States Assembly, and it was time to “call them out” for the failings of that Assembly.
Not only did that ignore the fact that they more or less consistently voted against the worst excesses of the Council of Ministers, it also falls apart under its own logic. For who else should, under Mr McNichol’s logic, be “called out” as culpable because they were part of the last Assembly? Who else but Sam Mezec, Monty Tadier and Geoff Southern! They, after all, by Mr McNichol’s strange reasoning, culpable for everything that was passed by the Assembly.
It was a classic case of opening the mouth without engaging the brain.
Reform have fielded a mixed-bag of candidates. Some, like Carina Alves, are excellent, but others seem to struggle. "Just wait while I find the page in the manifesto" is a sure sign of poor preparation, which I have heard more than one Reform candidate say. Matthew Price even caught out one candidate on Election Call asking why the manifesto had no section on the environment. It does, but they found it accidentally while looking for other material, and then announced that with a note of triumph... and surprise.
The Hustings: Don’t Tell Him Pike
The video of the St Clement’s Hustings must have more hits than others, as everyone wanted to see Samantha Morrison tear into Susie Pinel over her misjudged comments on poverty in Jersey. It is one of the few hustings performances with real passion in it, but I’m not sure it is entirely wise to vent anger on someone like that.
Past experience of watching hustings leads me to believe that it generally doesn’t do the individual any good. The public love a spat, but they won't vote for the person if they come across as too aggressive. Much better is the softly-softly approach of Monty Tadier, who, after Graham Truscott had been bemoaning the failures of the last Ministerial government, gently pointed out that to listen to “his colleague”, “you would never believe that he had actually been an assistant minister”.
It does beg the question as to how much say Assistant Ministers have. In the case of Tracey Valois, it was clear to me beyond all doubt that Alan Maclean wanted her as Assistant Minister at the Treasury to shut her up, and fend her off with trivial pursuits. When she got wise to that, and resigned, lo and behold the Minister announced he just was planning to give her a lot of important work to do. It sounds a good deal like one of Lindsay Ash’s fairy stories.
“Language can corrupt thought” (George Orwell)
Susie Pinel, in the St Clement’s Hustings came out with the remarkable revelation that there are no poor people in Jersey, just people on lower income. By the same token, there are no short people like me, but only people of lower height.
One of the worst traits, pointed out by George Orwell in his great essay “Politics and the English Language” is for politicians to use euphemistic language to define away unpalatable truths. It is clear that Deputy Pinel has picked up some of the less endearing traits of long-serving politicians.
Women in Politics
Garel Tucker is the latest woman standing in St Brelade No 2. Monty Tadier asked me who was the last woman to be elected as a Deputy in St Brelade No 2. You have to go quite a way back to Enid Quenaut who became Deputy in 1975 and retained the seat until she stood as Constable in 1987!
Election Posters or Election Poseurs?
Jason Lagadu’s large poster draped over a digger certainly attracted a lot of attention from my work colleagues, mainly that it was the most ridiculous thing they had seen in this election.
Apart from that some jollity was found over the poster announcing the Circus was coming to town, on the roundabout by the end of the tunnel, sitting neatly alongside a load of posters saying “Vote ...”. Alas, the joke was too much, and the offending banner was taken down, although some may think the announcement that “there will be clowns” is prophetic.
The cheapest poster is probably that of Stephen Ahier, which consists of a white laminated sheet of A4 with the words “Vote Ahier” in big black letters.
A number of candidates have gone for the dark professional background – Lyndon Farnham, Tracey Valois, Gordon Troy. I’m sure Lyndon’s hair has become a shade darker and less grey in his photo.
There are a lot less posters this time round, although as time has gone on, more have appeared overnight like some strange fungi - you could say they mushroomed! John Le Fondre's supporters must have been up half the night across the Island as there were lots, all at the regulation height in regulation places. The initial growth of Graham Truscotts saw a second wave about a week ago. Moz Scott started appearing everywhere. Even some Stevie Oceans turned up on a roundabout.
“Logic! said the Professor half to himself. Why don't they teach logic at these schools?” (C.S. Lewis)
John McNichol was probably the worst Reform candidate I have heard on Election Jersey. He said that the three sitting Deputies in St Helier No 1 had been part of the last States Assembly, and it was time to “call them out” for the failings of that Assembly.
Not only did that ignore the fact that they more or less consistently voted against the worst excesses of the Council of Ministers, it also falls apart under its own logic. For who else should, under Mr McNichol’s logic, be “called out” as culpable because they were part of the last Assembly? Who else but Sam Mezec, Monty Tadier and Geoff Southern! They, after all, by Mr McNichol’s strange reasoning, culpable for everything that was passed by the Assembly.
It was a classic case of opening the mouth without engaging the brain.
Reform have fielded a mixed-bag of candidates. Some, like Carina Alves, are excellent, but others seem to struggle. "Just wait while I find the page in the manifesto" is a sure sign of poor preparation, which I have heard more than one Reform candidate say. Matthew Price even caught out one candidate on Election Call asking why the manifesto had no section on the environment. It does, but they found it accidentally while looking for other material, and then announced that with a note of triumph... and surprise.
The Hustings: Don’t Tell Him Pike
The video of the St Clement’s Hustings must have more hits than others, as everyone wanted to see Samantha Morrison tear into Susie Pinel over her misjudged comments on poverty in Jersey. It is one of the few hustings performances with real passion in it, but I’m not sure it is entirely wise to vent anger on someone like that.
Past experience of watching hustings leads me to believe that it generally doesn’t do the individual any good. The public love a spat, but they won't vote for the person if they come across as too aggressive. Much better is the softly-softly approach of Monty Tadier, who, after Graham Truscott had been bemoaning the failures of the last Ministerial government, gently pointed out that to listen to “his colleague”, “you would never believe that he had actually been an assistant minister”.
It does beg the question as to how much say Assistant Ministers have. In the case of Tracey Valois, it was clear to me beyond all doubt that Alan Maclean wanted her as Assistant Minister at the Treasury to shut her up, and fend her off with trivial pursuits. When she got wise to that, and resigned, lo and behold the Minister announced he just was planning to give her a lot of important work to do. It sounds a good deal like one of Lindsay Ash’s fairy stories.
I want to read someone's "Confessions of an Assistant Minister" to tell it from the inside out. In this election, some seem to be taking credit for good stuff, while blaming the bad on those nasty Ministers. It is the best of both worlds, as the Vicar of Bray used to say.
For those not familiar with English history, the Vicar of Bray was a clergyman (Simon Aleyn) living around the time of the Reformation, who demonstrated remarkable contortions of principle in order to retain his ecclesiastic office despite the changes in the Established Church through the course of several English monarchs.
The great advantage of watching hustings on YouTube is, firstly, the audio is nice and clear, which is good for people like me with two hearing aids. A loop system can help, but the St Brelade’s Hustings for Deputy No 2 district was at St Bernadette’s Hall – which has no loop system. I found that out. It’s about time, with the disability provision of the discrimination law coming in, that candidates (who set the hustings venue) start to think about that. None of them - Monty Tadier, Graham Truscott or Tony Pike - covered themselves with much glory on that choice of venue.
The second advantage, rather like watching TV on catch-up and zipping through the adverts, is that you don’t have to listen to the boring bits. You can go straight to the Q&A, and even miss those people who just like the sound of their own voice. I won’t name them all, but one reminds me of a “go compare advert”, mainly that it is fronted by a musician who clearly likes the sound of his own voice..
Worst hustings so far – I’m afraid poor Tony Pike, who rather went to pieces at the St Brelade's Hustings. It was clear the chap had no experience of public speaking, but one can forgive that. One thing less forgivable was that he had evidently done no preparation on questions which might come up – “that will need looking into”, “I’d have to look into that further” being his favourite answers. It was distressing to watch him floundering.
It was like watching someone on Mastermind saying “pass” to all the questions, and part of the blame must not go to Mr Pike, but to those proposing him, who surely should have put some work in rehearsing him for the hustings and doing homework on questions. His team should have helped him. I think they’ve let him down.
Sadly, while 30 years ago, it might have been enough to be a “good chap”, those days are long gone. You do need to do some homework before standing for election.
Demise of the Website
Have you noticed have fewer and fewer candidates go to the time and trouble to set up a website? Instead, they have the vote.je platform, and usually in addition a "voteforme" facebook page. They seem a very easy option. I've just been looking at Linda Dodds, who has just got a website up, https://www.dodds.je/jersey, and looking at it I am struck by how much more structure you can put on a website, as well as some rather good visuals.
Political Persuasion
One of the most useless pieces of information is where candidates place themselves on “the political spectrum”, which is both linear, and goes from left to centre to right. Two dimensional tests of political persuasion are generally better, although still deficient.
The idea that people lean on way or the other is, quite frankly, ludicrous, and indeed one candidate standing may be seen to lean (and sway alarmingly) both to left and right in the course of a hustings. It would be unfair to name names: suffice it to say that if you've seen that Hustings, you'll know who I mean.
But one of the strangest answers (in the JEP) came from Gordon Troy who said “Royalist and Conservative”. Visions go through one’s head of Cavaliers and Roundheads! Has anyone told him the English Civil War ended some time ago?
Here, anyway, are some revised political persuasions of a confectionary kind. Are you a soft centre, slightly nutty, or not to be truffled with?
But one of the strangest answers (in the JEP) came from Gordon Troy who said “Royalist and Conservative”. Visions go through one’s head of Cavaliers and Roundheads! Has anyone told him the English Civil War ended some time ago?
Here, anyway, are some revised political persuasions of a confectionary kind. Are you a soft centre, slightly nutty, or not to be truffled with?
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