A Battle at Fort Regent
An interesting piece by John Henwood in the JEP:
“In its heyday the Fort was a major attraction for visitors and the local community. However, tourism, which in the 1960s had been our principal economic activity, fell out of favour among States Members. The Sport, Leisure & Recreation Committee (SLR) decided the emphasis should shift from leisure to sport; possibly the Fort’s director disagreed, but in any event an attempt to force the transfer to the Fort of a civil servant from the Education Department led to an acrimonious dispute and ultimately the departure of the director who had been appointed only 18 months earlier.”
“This was soon followed by the appointment as director of the officer from Education who, incidentally, had previously been an unsuccessful candidate for the job and who had the strong support of the SLR Committee President. On 27 July 1993 the President of the Establishment Committee (the forerunner of today’s States Employment Board) made a statement to the Assembly setting out the official side of the whole affair in the hope of putting the issue to bed, but the rancour rumbled on for many months leaving the legacy that Fort Regent was political pariah.”
As the States Minutes show, Miss Mary Alexander who was welcomed as the new Chief Officer of the Sport, Leisure and Recreation Committee in 1992 by the Bailiff, but relations with Terry le Main who was President of the SLR quickly turned sour.
In a statement he made to the Assembly, the President of Establishment Comittee (Senator Dick Shenton) set out almost a case for the prosecution, of Miss Alexander being in the wrong and found guilty. His statement noted that:
“In making its decision to appoint Miss Alexander, the Board recognised that a local applicant, Mr. V. Bourgoise, had been a close contender for the post and that it should, therefore, be a part of Miss Alexander's duties to develop someone, possibly Mr. Bourgoise, in order that they could assume the Chief Officer's role at the time of the termination of her contract. Miss Alexander was appointed formally to the post with effect from 1st November 1991, for a period of five years.”
It is no secret that Vic Bourgoise was Deputy Le Main’s preferred candidate for the post, and the rumblings in the JEP regarding the dispute did ask the questions whether this caused a vexations relationship from the start as a result. Mary Alexander later noted that she “almost immediately encountered opposition” on her appointment.
The statements were to have taken place “in camera”, but Mary Alexander's own express wish was that these matters be made public, and given the high publicity, to hide behind closed doors was not deemed sensible.
It slated her noting that there were “many allegations that she would not listen to advice and that it appeared that she was attempting to prevent Mr. Bourgoise being accommodated in a revised Sport, Leisure and Recreation structure.”
“In addition, it was fairly common knowledge throughout the Civil Service that a number of chief officers found it difficult to work with Miss Alexander.”
It should be noted, and I think it is pertinent, that at the time Mary Alexander was very much the exception in being the first woman taking up a Chief Officer appointment. The cultural landscape of the early 1990s was not without a degree of misogyny, which is well reflected in the TV series “Yes Minister”.
The introduction of a woman into an all-male enclave almost certainly ruffled some feathers, so the statement is not perhaps surprising although of course it suggests that she was a “difficult woman” rather than casting a more critical eye on her colleagues and their attitudes.
In the States, the statement also noted that:
“I think that you will agree with me that the relationship between a Committee and its chief officer, and between chief officer and chief officer is vital to the smooth and efficient operation of our government. What I have recounted above shows without any shadow of doubt that Miss Alexander had lost the trust and confidence both of her Committee and certain of her chief officer colleagues. In these circumstances, it was my judgement that this trust and confidence could not be regained and that it was, therefore, appropriate to seek to terminate Miss Alexander's contract.”
It was hardly surprising that after left, Vic Bougeois was immediately appointed to replace her!
A somewhat different perspective came from Mary Alexander (now Mary Young after she married JEP columnist Gordon Young. Writing in the 2016 Grouville Gazette, she noted that:
“Arriving on Jersey’s shores back in ‘91 to take on the role of Chief Officer Sports and Recreation, Mary Alexander, as she was then, almost immediately encountered opposition and found herself locking horns with one or two of the leading politicians of the day and for a while found herself making the front page headlines of the Jersey Evening Post for all the wrong reasons.”
“No doubt finding the company of animals rather more appealing than dealing with politicians, Mary spent seven years at Durrell as Press and PR Manager organising a variety of projects including Saga visits and even a trip to Buckingham Palace to meet Durrell’s Honorary President, The Princess Royal.”
Under its new management, and under the “guidance” of Terry Le Main, as John Henwood explains, the sorry saga continued:
“The politician then in charge, Terry Le Main (I don't recall whether he was Deputy or Senator at the time) decided it should no longer cater for visitors and instead become a sports centre. One by one the attractions went: the daytime shows in the piazza, the dancing fountains, the big entertainments events, the vivarium, the aquarium, the funfair in the East Ditch, the shops, the nightclub, the restaurant and so much more. And of course the pool was deemed too expensive to maintain. And so it became a vast, largely empty, shell and nothing deteriorates quicker than a very old, largely unused building.”
In 2010, the States looked at a proposition “to establish and lead a working group, consisting of representatives from the Education, Sport and Culture Department, Jersey Property Holdings, the Jersey Heritage Trust, the Economic Development Department and the Planning and Environment Department, in order to ensure collaboration between these key parties, with the aim of producing a cohesive and realistic plan for the future development of Fort Regent”
Senator Le Main was absent – “en default” – from the vote.
In the States, the statement also noted that:
“I think that you will agree with me that the relationship between a Committee and its chief officer, and between chief officer and chief officer is vital to the smooth and efficient operation of our government. What I have recounted above shows without any shadow of doubt that Miss Alexander had lost the trust and confidence both of her Committee and certain of her chief officer colleagues. In these circumstances, it was my judgement that this trust and confidence could not be regained and that it was, therefore, appropriate to seek to terminate Miss Alexander's contract.”
It was hardly surprising that after left, Vic Bougeois was immediately appointed to replace her!
A somewhat different perspective came from Mary Alexander (now Mary Young after she married JEP columnist Gordon Young. Writing in the 2016 Grouville Gazette, she noted that:
“Arriving on Jersey’s shores back in ‘91 to take on the role of Chief Officer Sports and Recreation, Mary Alexander, as she was then, almost immediately encountered opposition and found herself locking horns with one or two of the leading politicians of the day and for a while found herself making the front page headlines of the Jersey Evening Post for all the wrong reasons.”
“No doubt finding the company of animals rather more appealing than dealing with politicians, Mary spent seven years at Durrell as Press and PR Manager organising a variety of projects including Saga visits and even a trip to Buckingham Palace to meet Durrell’s Honorary President, The Princess Royal.”
Under its new management, and under the “guidance” of Terry Le Main, as John Henwood explains, the sorry saga continued:
“The politician then in charge, Terry Le Main (I don't recall whether he was Deputy or Senator at the time) decided it should no longer cater for visitors and instead become a sports centre. One by one the attractions went: the daytime shows in the piazza, the dancing fountains, the big entertainments events, the vivarium, the aquarium, the funfair in the East Ditch, the shops, the nightclub, the restaurant and so much more. And of course the pool was deemed too expensive to maintain. And so it became a vast, largely empty, shell and nothing deteriorates quicker than a very old, largely unused building.”
In 2010, the States looked at a proposition “to establish and lead a working group, consisting of representatives from the Education, Sport and Culture Department, Jersey Property Holdings, the Jersey Heritage Trust, the Economic Development Department and the Planning and Environment Department, in order to ensure collaboration between these key parties, with the aim of producing a cohesive and realistic plan for the future development of Fort Regent”
Senator Le Main was absent – “en default” – from the vote.
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