A necessary change of direction

Here's the JEP Leader Column. In particular, note on mask wearing: "The delay, [The Chief Minister] said, was because the law proved hard to draft. The UK had made mask-wearing mandatory in shops in July, France at the end of August. Jersey is not short of lawyers or legal expertise."

A necessary change of direction
The voice of the JEP

IT is likely that Friday afternoon’s press conference evoked a mix of reaction and emotion. Hastily called after a briefing the evening before was cancelled, again at short notice, it saw Dr Ivan Muscat, the deputy medical officer of health, and the Chief Minister, Senator John Le Fondré, announce new, tougher measures to slow the spread of Covid-19.

It followed days of worry as infection numbers continued their climb, forcing yet more uncomfortable comparisons with our sister island. The first emotion for many must surely have been relief that, finally, ministers were listening to calls for tougher measures.

The new regulations allow just one gathering on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.

Households were told not to mix. Painful hindsight triggered by the widely ignored ‘strong recommendation’ to wear masks, plus the UK experience showing legislation and enforcement was needed to achieve compliance, meant nothing short of a legally enforceable order was necessary. 

Earlier last week, this column finished with the words that sometimes the courageous thing to do was accept that you had got it wrong and change direction.

Some credit, therefore, to the Chief Minister for changing course, albeit only when the bow was inches from rocks and when other places were also changing tack.

Once again the clear case for pre-emptive action, to go early and go hard, had been ignored. It’s a lesson this Island’s leaders should have learned by now.

Another reaction might well have been disgust and despair at what an undignified and poisonous circus these Facebook live briefings have become. The stream of invective which flowed like a mass-participation ticker-tape poisoned-pen letter threatened to upstage the speakers, even as they discussed matters of life and death. 

How did we get to this point? Robust challenge and holding power to account is an essential democratic right and need, but not that. That moved public debate on not one step.

Perhaps the strongest reaction was provoked following a comment by the Chief Minister, almost an aside as he turned away from the camera to hand the conch to Dr Muscat. In response to a question as to why mask-wearing had not been made compulsory earlier, he said that he had wanted to make it law as well. As we now know, that was also the advice of STAC in October. The delay, he said, was because the law proved hard to draft. The UK had made mask-wearing mandatory in shops in July, France at the end of August. Jersey is not short of lawyers or legal expertise.

In that moment – another in which the Chief Minister seemed to fill awkward, doubtful press conference moments by thinking, unfiltered out loud – he laid bare the extent of the indecision, lack of clear thinking and strategic insight that has so dogged his premiership.

The irony is that had his administration ensured that the STAC minutes were published immediately after meetings, as required by a States Assembly vote, there is every chance that the public debate that would have followed would have helped Jersey make the right decision.

Openness. Honesty. Getting ahead of the curve. Clear-sighted and empathetic leadership. Those are the cornerstones of an effective coronavirus response.