Occasional Thoughts

The Truth about Wisdom, Justice, Compassion and Integrity

2012-01-23T21:00:00.000Z

Wisdom, Justice, Compassion, Integrity - these words are set in gold on the ceremonial mace in the Scottish Parliament. They assert the Scottish people's aspiration for the character of its government. Whether we are heading towards `devo max' or full independence, you are almost certain to hear much more about them in years to come.

A future history of Scotland might begin, "In the beginning, were the words.. ."

And - you might not know this - just like the Beatles there was nearly a fifth one, but more of that later.

The Mace was presented to the Scottish Parliament by the Queen, but the words first entered the nation's consciousness through Donald Dewar's speech at the opening ceremony: "Wisdom, Justice, Compassion, Integrity - timeless values, honourable aspirations for this new forum of democracy."

I don't remember giving the words much thought at the time. I may have assumed they were either Donald Dewar's own idea or borrowed from the writings of someone like David Hume. Or perhaps the selection was approved by some grand overseeing committee for the new Parliament.

The Mace was presented by the Queen on the opening of the Scottish Parliament

It was a few years before I heard mention of the four words again. Keir Bloomer, a titan of educational thinking in Scotland, was addressing a gathering of aspiring Head Teachers in Seamill Hydro. His exhortation that day was that these four qualities - wisdom, justice, compassion and integrity - were just the values that should underpin the endeavours of all those working in Scottish Education. Not long afterwards, they were. Officially. The founding committee of Scotland's new Curriculum for Excellence decreed that these words should be at the very core of everything the education system should aim to achieve. I am sure it was no coincidence that their most vocal champion, Keir Bloomer, was a prominent member of this committee.


The Scottish Education Weave - an aide memoire for teachers to help them recall key principles of the Curriculum for Excellence. Everything flows from the four values: wisdom - justice - compassion - integrity

I was yet to be convinced, however. These are great-sounding words, I thought, but why these four in particular? There are lots of other great-sounding words after all - honesty, fairness, tolerance, trust for example. And since we are talking about Scotland, how about thrift, prudence or financial propriety? (This was of course in the golden age pre-Fred Goodwin.)

But the more I thought about it, the more these four words in particular seemed especially well chosen. Just as the primary colours can be mixed in different ways to produce every other colour, it struck me that these four `primary' values could be used to generate the other contenders. Honesty and trust, for example, can be seen as implicit in integrity. Mercy? I would say it is mainly compassion, with a dash of wisdom, and maybe a soupçon of justice.

That thought got me wondering once again about the origin of the four words. I was astonished when, on using wisdom, justice, compassion and integrity as the search terms in Google, the first document listed was a blog posting of my own from 2009! I took this as a sign that I needed to do something to justify this ludicrously exalted position and repay Google for its misplaced faith in me!

Bizarrely an earlier posting of mine was #1 on Google. I took it as a message to get busy.

Enquiries to the Scottish Parliament produced an abundance of helpful information, including this:

"The four words inscribed into the Mace of the Scottish Parliament– wisdom, justice, compassion, integrity - were selected by Michael Lloyd, thesilversmith who designed the Mace. It is believed that Mr Lloyd selected thesewords as the ideals that the people of Scotland would aspire to for theirMembers of Parliament."

So I would need to speak to the creator himself. Michael Lloyd is a highly respected silversmith, one of ten invited to submit a design for the mace. He lives in Galloway, and his work reflects his love of nature.

Beyond `Galloway' the internet was silent on how I might contact Michael. More traditional methods were called for. Scotland, it is sometimes said, is just one big village. My mother happens to live in a Galloway village. A family friend, the traditional clogmaker Godfrey Smith, lives in the next village. Godfrey duly intervened and soon afterwards Michael Lloyd phoned me up.

Michael Lloyd, with the mace that he designed and made.

Michael told me how the brief he was given for the design of the mace was that it was to represent the authority of the Parliament, and that this authority would only be valid if given by the Scottish nation. The Queen had announced that she would present the mace herself. Everything was on a very tight timescale - he had just three months to design and make the mace.

"And what about the four values - Wisdom, Justice, Compassion, Integrity - what gave you the idea for them?" I asked. "I felt that these values and hopes were very much in the air to be collected and celebrated," he told me. He went on to explain his surprise that they were simply accepted, without the need for debate or approval by a grand committee.

Grand committe or not, I felt honoured to have the opportunity to congratulate him on his excellent choice.

"Oh I nearly forgot," he said. "There was another word that I thought would be very suitable, but there was no room for it." And he told me what it was.

The fifth word. What do you think?

I will reveal all, but it would be fun to hear some suggestions first. Over to you!

Wisdom, Justice, Compassion, Integrity and . . . .

2012-01-14T10:48:00.000Z

I have now learned the origins of the four words inscribed on the Scottish Parliament Mace. I also know what the 5th word would have been, had there been room. My next posting here will tell the story.

Let it Bee

2012-01-13T21:02:00.002Z

And the Lord said
let there be bees
and let them buzz.
And there wuzz.

(c) Michael Warren

A Personal History of Coffe in Scotland

2012-01-13T20:51:00.001Z

I may be in the Grumpy Old Man age group now, but I can remember being grumpy as a teenager - I know you are supposed to be surly at that age, but I plumped for grumpy. Back then I had three pet hates - the three Cs: caravans, coffee and Cream.

Caravan loathing was easily explained - family holidays in the Highlands mostly spent on the tortuous roads of the 60s in a barely mobile queue behind the inevitable caravaner. The proud owner of a powerful Rover 2000, with a front grille festooned with a row of hefty metal badges like Prussian campaign medals, proclaiming his allegiance to the AA, RAC and the Handlebar Moustache Drivers Club of Great Britain, he just knew that the `road unsuitable for caravans' sign couldn't possibly apply to him.

You'll have noticed the capital letter and twigged that coffee and Cream are not a pair. Yes, astonishingly it was the rock band I couldn't stand. Admittedly I had only ever heard `Badge', which I rather liked. It was in fact nothing to do with the music, but a reaction to boys a year or two older who, unlike me, had sneaked into the Cream generation and didn't they need you to know it. Nowadays I love most of Cream's music, though I still think Clapton lost it with `Layla' - ever tried dancing to the last six and a half minutes?

And then there was coffee. Fancying myself as a teenage iconoclast, I defined myself as a non-coffee drinker for no other reason than that virtually everyone else seemed to revel in it: remember that in the 70s there was still something faintly louche about coffee. The story of every addiction has its defining moments, and my first one came as a student. Our hall of residence rooms were furtively equipped with a surprising gift at the start of each term - a little tin of Nescafe (remember the tins?). To begin with, I simply gave them to my coffee-drinking neighbour. Then, with my first major exams looming, it occurred to me that the sleep-denying qualities of coffee might come in handy. So one evening, with a view to extending my studying time, I took a spoonful of the stuff, washing the gritty granules down as quickly as possible with copious amounts of water. And it worked! I was able to study for a full hour longer before the equations started swimming across the page.

With the psychological barrier broken, it was not long before I started to accept the occasional social coffee. Mostly these were those milky concoctions with a digusting skin of sickly slime and the merest suggestion of a coffee taste - a recipe dating from 1950s Scotland and our nation's dubious contribution to coffee culture. It was coffee made for people who didn't like coffee but thought they ought to drink it. The Dutch have an apt word for this coffee-esque drink: koffie verkeerd - coffee gone wrong.

But slowly the Scottish palate was becoming more sophisticated, with foreign holidays in France and Italy introducing many of us for the first time to a completely new style of coffee. Unfortunately, in our attempts to emulate this, we chose as our coffee-maker of preference the percolator.

The percolator was the wedding gift de rigeur of the 80s, and the centrepiece of many a Thatcher-era dinner party. You can still find a few, sold as retro chic, on eBay. But some things from the past are best left there. The percolator was always an unneccessarily complicated means of arriving at another version of coffee gone wrong - the tepid, insipid and lifeless version that was Scotland's second flirtation with coffee culture.

Only in recent years have we arrived at the happy situation in Scotland where you can get a decent coffee in most of the larger towns and cities, though you still need to know where to look and only a few offerings match what you can confidently expect from even the most un-prepossessing cafe in France. Nowadays, in the grip of a joyous addiction, a morning in town will often start with two double espressos. Which brings me to one last grump. I don't mind paying £1.50 for a tiny coffee when a larger measure is available for a sensible increment. But there are still places that will try to fleece you by simply doubling the price - deftly insinuating strong coffee into the same aspirational class as malt whisky. Such places are best avoided, and not just on grounds of cost: your coffee will be made and delivered by a genuinely surly teenager.

Life is a contradictory undertaking. With age comes not just grumpiness, but mellowness. Nowadays I can think of few things better than waking in my caravan, on a sunny west coast pitch with views out to sea, and starting the day with a generous cafetiere of Taylor's Hot Java Lava (Strength 6) to a soundtrack of Disraeli Gears.

Descartes Visits Scotland

2012-01-13T20:40:00.003Z

Descartes Visits Scotland

I think.
Therefore I am.

If I think
I am Scottish.
am I?

I think
I am Scottish
ish.
Therefore I am.

(c) Michael Warren

Culture Change in Banking - an Opportunity

2009-12-03T12:53:00.000Z

So the RBS board members are threatening to resign if Alistair Darling does not let them pay big bonuses. Doesn't this just say it all about the banking culture that brought world banking and the economy to its knees? Let them resign! At the core of what went wrong was the toxic effect of a banking culture that promised huge bonuses and therefore attracted precisely the wrong sort of people, i.e. those motivated purely by egregious greed. To change the culture we need to attract able but pricipled people into banking - people who will be happy with more reasonable remuneration and will get their kicks from the satisfaction of a job well done rather than their next new car. Without this change there will be no real culture change in the world of banking, with the continuing risk of further calamity. AD should start the ball rolling - by rolling some heads!

News Reaches UK of Senator Arrest in Tinpot Dictatorship

2009-07-10T08:43:00.004+01:00

News of the arrest of Senator Stuart Syvret and the charges brought against him under the Data Protection Act by the States of Jersey has finally reached UK shores as recorded by the Times, the Independent and Channel 4 News.

The politically-motivated arrest and charges are a blatant gagging attempt by the de facto dictatorship that runs the island in the interests of the rich and well-connected.

In his blog based campaign seeking justice for survivors of Jersey's culture of institutionalised abuse Senator Syvret has frequently named names and challenged those named to take action against him for defamation. Despite a readership approaching 200,000 - more than twice the island's population - no such action has been taken against Syvret. It must therefore be assumed that the named individuals are guilty and know that the Senator has compelling evidence that would emerge in court in any defamation case.

Yet the Jersey authorities seem intent on burying bad news by attempting to silence the leading whistleblower, rather than pursue alleged abusers. They announced recently that eleven investigations had been dropped due to `lack of evidence' and it is widely expected on the island that further such announcements will follow. Meanwhile abuse survivors, denied the redress of justice through prosecution of their abusers, are preparing to launch civil actions against the States of Jersey.

The ham-fisted attempt of the Jersey oligarchy to crush dissent betrays a mindset of presumed unquestioned power. At best this might be likened to the regime of a third-rate 1950s public school - but most current observers will find more compelling parallels in the actions of despotic rulers and power cliques in countries such as Zimbabwe, North Korea and Iran.

The Catholic Church in Ireland

2009-07-03T20:44:00.003+01:00

Suffered the little children
in whom the Priest came.

The Bishop forgave the Priest.

Rot in Hell they cried
outside the courtroom.

The Bishop prayed for the Priest.
The Pope
said nothing.

The Church called lawyers
to oppose the claims.
The Bishop led prayers for the Priest.
The Pope stayed
in the Vatican.

The Priest will reap
what he has sown,
in this life or the next.

Unless God is a Catholic.

(c) Michael Warren 2009

Beyond Belief

2009-06-23T20:37:00.011+01:00

Colm O'Gorman's recently published book "Beyond Belief" is the account of his childhood abuse at the hands of a Catholic priest, the estrangement from his own family that was a direct result, and his long journey of recovery.

It has been a remarkable journey. In his late teens, haunted by the trauma of the abuse but unable to speak about it to anyone, he left his Wexford home, ending up homeless and destitute in Dublin. Some twenty years later, in 2003, he was chosen as one of Ireland's People of the Year.

The story of the intervening years charts his many struggles - finding a job and getting a roof over his head, coming to terms with his own sexuality, recovering the ability to trust and build relationships, building a successful career, the eventual reconciliation with his family, and ultimately his decision to confront his past and fight for justice.

The reason for his decision in 1998 finally to contact the police was the fear that his abuser, Father Sean Fortune, might still be claiming other victims. Even as he found the courage to speak out for the first time, he was still in denial of the events that had damaged him:

"Denial is a splendid defence mechanism; a comfortable kind of ignorance I learned to embrace with all the enthusiasm of those who had taught it to me. I'm not being sarcastic; denial is a powerful, powerful defence mechanism. If you can't change something, can't escape it or defeat it and if surrender to it has its own dark horrors, then denial becomes your very best friend. You can deny what's happening even as it is happening. I always found a spot on the wall as I was being pawed at and disappeared into it, placing my entire focus on that spot or stain or cabbage rose wallpaper pattern until it was over, until it was safe to return to my body and to the world." (p128)

The police quickly gathered a mass of compelling evidence against Fortune, not just from Colm O'Gorman, but from nearly 30 other victims. In court he was charged with 29 specific offences against 8 victims and pleaded not guilty. But the closure of having the charges tested in court was never to come. In March 1999, Sean Fortune committed suicide. He had taken a lethal cocktail of drugs and whiskey and was found dead in bed by his housekeeper. He had been remanded in custody pending trial but had been released on bail days earlier.

O'Gorman and others had been denied the prospect of justice by Fortune's final act. They would now only ever be his alleged victims. But by this time, however, much wider concerns about an apparent cover-up in the Catholic Church in Ireland had surfaced. Suspicion fell on Bishop Brendan Comiskey, and his predecessor in the Ferns Diocese Bishop Herlihy. Both men were said to have failed to act on a number of previous abuse allegations about Fortune, simply moving him from one pastoral assignment to another. Pointedly Bishop Comiskey issued a statement after Fortune's death inviting people "to remember him and his family in their prayers at this difficult time". O'Gorman widened his quest for justice by taking out civil actions against the Diocese and even against the Pope himself through the person of the Dublin Papal Nuncio.

O'Gorman was outraged by the silence of the Catholic Church in Ireland and its failure to act over repeated claims of sexual abuse by a significant number of its priests over many decades.

"Silence in the case of very great wrong, " he argues, " has a deeply corrupting effect. It diminishes and cheapens us all, and denies us the opportunity to confront that wrong and make it right. And yet, so often we stay silent in the face of abuse. If we can make it invisible and secret then we don't have to deal with it. But our silence has victims, and not always obvious ones. A hurt denied and ignored can rarely heal. More likely it will fester for years after the event." (p227)

Not only did the Catholic Church remain silent and inactive over a 14 year period when they were receiving regular complaints against Fortune, but O'Gorman discovered that as early as 1986 the Archbishop of Dublin had sought legal advice with regard to the Church's legal and financial liability if a priest was returned to the ministry after undergoing some form of treatment - and abused again. The liability was made clear and the Archbishop was advised that there was a duty in law to remove a priest from ministry if an investigation established that there was a basis for complaint.

"So what did the Archbishop do? Did he immediately remove from ministry priests who had been accused? Did he inform the police and social services of all accusations and ensure a proper investigation? Did he put in place a robust child protection policy? Did he inform his brother bishops of what he had discovered and alert them to this legal difficulty and their responsibility in law to remove credibly accused priests?

No, he did none of that.

Instead, on the advice of his lawyers he . . . took out an insurance policy to protect against the costs of any claims resulting from priests raping and abusing children. He did not act to protect children; he acted to protect the Church's money." (p 287)

It took until 2003 before the Diocese of Ferns finally settled with an admission of negligence and an award of damages. The action against the Papal Nuncio was dropped after he claimed diplomatic immunity.

O'Gorman's tireless campaign achieved a measure of justice for himself and many other victims who he has encouraged and supported; and he has contributed significantly to a cultural change in Ireland, where the people and the state are no longer content with a hands-off attitude towards abuse within the Church. This change offers a promise of a far more robust response to cases of clerical abuse, and an understanding of the need for effective child protection becoming ingrained within Irish society.

But worldwide the battle against the Catholic Church's tendency towards denial, cover-up and obstruction continues. While lessons may have been learned in the western world, there are signs that little has changed in developing countries. On a visit to Brazil, for example, O'Gorman uncovered many current cases of children abused by priests, together with a very similar pattern of cover-up and denial that had been common in Ireland, the USA and elsewhere twenty or thirty years earlier.

And the stench of guilt again goes right to the very top: Cardinal Ratzinger, before he became Pope Benedict XVI, sent a letter instructing all bishops that every case of sexual abuse involving a priest anywhere in the world was to be referred to the Vatican.

The message to the Roman Catholic Church in the biblical quotation with which O'Gorman ends the book could hardly be clearer:

Let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. (1 John 3:18)

Archbishops' cover-up of child sex abuse revealed (Irish Independent 23/11/09)

Decline and Fall of the Jersey Empire

2009-05-11T18:40:00.005+01:00

Some well-researched articles with a lot of background on the Jersey abuse scandal.

Cathy Scott-Clark Guardian 14 March

Eileen Fairweather Mail on Sunday 18 April

David James Smith Sunday Times 10 May

There is also an Early Day Motion in the House of Commons relating to the politicised police harassment of Jersey's leading dissident, Senator Stuart Syvret. It may sound like I am talking about Burma, China or Zimbabwe here. I make no apologies: I honestly don't think the comparison is too far fetched. The motion has been proposed by Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming. At the time of writing it has picked up 19 signatories, despite MPs' preoccupation with other matters; and the list includes Labour, Lib Dem and Conservative MPs.

Wisdom, Justice, Compassion, Integrity

2009-04-26T20:46:00.007+01:00

The words "Wisdom, Justice, Compassion, Integrity" are woven into thistles at the head of the mace to represent the aspirations of the Scottish people for the Members of their Parliament.

I do not know how those four words in particular came to be on the mace, and at first glance it seems easy to think of others that might have sat there quite nicely. Truth, trust, honesty, tolerance for example.

But the words on the mace are really clusters of dispositions, rather than discreet concepts; thus the creators have also ensured value for money - many words for the price of just four. Tolerance, for example, is surely implicit in compassion; and truth, trust (trusting and trusted) and honesty are core ingredients of integrity.

If you want to know what a western government looks like when it lacks wisdom, justice, compassion and integrity, you need look no further than the island of Jersey, and in particular the response of the island's establishment to the allegations of decades of concealed abuse in its childcare establishments.

The best starting place is here.

Flat Earth News in Jersey Too

2009-04-13T09:33:00.007+01:00

David Rose is an experienced writer and investigative journalist who has worked for the Observer and the Daily Mail, and is by all accounts a decent sort. But he caused dismay to many in Jersey when, last November, he wrote a piece in the Mail enthusiastically endorsing the establishment's attempts to discredit Lenny Harper's investigation. The article contained clear signs that he had been got at by the establishment's PR machine. But why would such a seasoned journalist have been so easily duped by transparently self-serving spin?

The answer may lie in Nick Davies's polemic on the dire condition of the UK media "Flat Earth News", published earlier in the year. In his book, Davies characterises Rose as having "all of the self-confidence of the great reporters, but less of the judgement." And here is why. During the period between 9/11 and the war on Iraq, Davies tells how Rose wrote a series of "high profile and aggressive" stories for the Observer linking the 9/11 attacks (amongst other atrocities) to Iraq, and trumpeting his belief that Saddam Hussein was preparing weapons of mass distruction. This campaign led to the Observer endorsing the Bush/Blair illegal war, and ultimately caused serious damage to the paper's reputation for well-evidenced independent journalism.

Rose has since confessed that his enthusiasm for the invasion had been "misplaced and naive" and that he had been the victim of a "calculated set-up , devised to foster the propaganda case for war". He had allowed himself to be misled both by accounts from unreliable Iraqi defectors and by deliberate misinformation from CIA and MI6 sources. He has since published a retraction. (Roger Alton, whose role in this fiasco is starkly detailed by Davies, resigned as editor of the Observer shortly before the book was published.)

Whether or not the Jersey oligarchy knew that Rose had a history of being duped, they fed their line to an investigative journalist with clear potential to be manipulated. (Davies, incidentally, has also written about the Harper investigation, but mainly as a critique of the media for over-hyping police press releases.)

Davies's book is a fascinating read for anyone interested in poking beneath what is presented as fact in large swathes of the UK national media. It sheds light on what motivates Rupert Murdoch, Andrew Neil, Paul Dacre and the other unsavoury big beasts who have presided over the decline of journalistic ethics in the UK in the last 20 years or so. It is not hard to see some of the same structural fault-lines that he describes at play in the Jersey media.

I was thinking of reviewing "Flat Earth News", but it is quicker and far more useful to suggest you read this.

Allitt, Shipman and . . .?

2009-03-21T19:37:00.015Z

In November 1991 nurse Beverley Allitt was charged with attempted murder and grievous bodily harm after evidence emerged that she had attacked 13 children in her care in a 15 day period. Four of the children died. In May 1993 she was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to 13 concurrent life terms. Allitt was sentenced to a minimum term of 40 years imprisonment, later reduced on appeal to 30. She is currently being held at Rampton secure hospital.

GP Harold Shipman was arrested and charged with murder in September 1998. He stood trial in October 1999, accused of killing 15 elderly patients. In January 2000 he was found guilty on all counts and given a life sentence. The Shipman enquiry reported in July 2002 that he had killed at least 215 patients, and possibly many more. Shipman was found dead in his cell in January 2004, having hanged himself.

In May 1999, Jersey's chief police officer sent a report to Attorney General Michael Birt seeking approval to pursue an investigation against a former nurse who had worked at Jersey's General Hospital. The confidential report included evidencen from several witnesses alleging that this individual may have been responsible for the deaths of 13 patients during February and March 1998. The former nurse had already been sacked following prosecution for theft of drugs from the hospital. On searching premises where he had been living police discovered, amongst other suspicious items, eleven syringes containing a clear liquid, together with various medications. A police surgeon attested that if a person with a serious medical history were to be injected with the combination of drugs found, the cause of death would not be clearly apparent. The drugs recovered in the raid were sufficient for several lethal doses.

What happened? Nothing. The subject of the allegations is believed to be living and working on Jersey. The police report to Jersey's Attorney General has recently been made public. You can read it here. Alternatively, I have reproduced it below. In July 2009 Senator Stuart Syvret was arrested by the States of Jersey Police and charged with Data Protection offences. One of the charges apparently related to his publication of this item of evidence on his blog. The legal action against my rule that he must remove this material, but it's out there now, in many places, including right here:

STATES OF JERSEY POLICE

Your ref:

Our ref: RHLeB/PAO

Date: 12th May 1999.

TO:

M C St. J. Birt Esq. QC.
HM Attorney General
Law Officers’ Department
Morier House
Halkett Place
St. Helier
JE1 1DD

Dear Attorney General

Andrew Charles MAROLIA

I refer to the attached report by Detective Inspector Faudemer concerning the above named who is currently on remand from the Magistrates' Court for a variety of charges involving Drugs, Theft and Firearms.

Mr. Faudemer's report details allegations and innuendo, the most serious of which indicate that Marolia may, over a period of time, have terminated the lives of some patients at the General Hospital where he was employed as a Nurse.

I support Mr. Faudemer's recommendation that if enquiries are to continue a phased approach should be undertaken, the first of which would be to collate further evidence. However, I recognise that the continuation and development of this investigation will require a high level of legal advice and guidance from your department and our work will impinge upon the Health Authority and Viscount and given the uniqueness and sensitivity of such an investigation I feel it is appropriate to hold a high level meeting with yourself and others to whom I have copied this letter.

The purpose of the meeting will be to receive an oral brief from Mr. Faudemer who will be able to answer questions which you and others may have, followed by a general discussion to determine the way forward.

The meeting has been arranged for Thursday 20th May at 2.15 p.m. in the Conference Room at Police Headquarters and I look forward to seeing you.

Yours sincerely,

R. H. Le Breton
Chief Officer

c.c. Legal Adviser – Mr. Ian Christmas, Deputy Viscount – Mr. P. De Gruchy, Chief Executive Health Service – Mr. G Jennings, Deputy Chief Officer – Mr. R. Jones, Superintendent – T. Garrett, Director of Finance – Mr. M. Szpera.

REPORT

Submitted by: Detective Inspector B. Faudemer.

Date: 8th May, 1999.

Subject: Investigation of Nurse Andrew Charles MAROLIA.

Sir,

This report has been compiled into three separate areas, namely:

1.Evidence which gives rise to concern, relating to the activities of Andrew Charles MAROLIA.

2. The recommended for phase 1 of any investigation.

3. The suggested manpower requirements for conducting such an investigation.

BACKGROUND

On Thursday, 1st April, 1999, Police Officers attended the home address of a female who disclosed that Andrew Charles MAROLIA, a Staff Nurse on Corbiere Ward, had stolen and stored drugs at her home address. The female, an ex-lover of Mr. MAROLIA, produced to the officers, drugs in the form of Valium and Hypnoval, together with a syringe containing clear liquid and several packets of Coproxamol. These have since been identified and their content verified. Hypnoval is more commonly known as a 'date rape' drug. Enquiries confirmed that the drugs were from the hospital and indeed had been sent from the Hospital Pharmacy to Corbiere Ward, where Mr. MAROLIA worked.

A check on the Firearms Register held at Police Headquarters, revealed that Mr. MAROLIA had possession of several firearms, and that his Firearms License had expired in October, 1998. The female who handed the drugs to the Police confirmed that MAROLIA had attended at her premises with a loaded firearm.

Mr. MAROLIA was arrested on returning to the Island on the 17th April, 1999, and, armed with a Warrant, his home address was searched. During the search, the following property was recovered.

1. One lump of brown cannabis resin, tablets and scales.
2. Knuckle-duster.
3. A Police Philips radio (in working order).
4. Bag containing various medications.
5. Eleven syringes with a clear liquid within, and other medication, including
two bottles of potassium chloride.
6. Six firearms, with large quantity of ammunition.
7. One expired Firearms Certificate.

MAROLIA was interviewed concerning the medication found, and at first suggested that the insulin in the eleven syringes was intended as an aid to body-building. He later changed this story, in that he intended to kill himself with the medication, by marching down to the Cenotaph in military dress, where he would inject himself with a lethal dose of insulin and potassium chloride.

He claimed that the medication recovered from his ex-girlfriend's address by the Police, which prompted the investigation, had originated from himself, but that he had taken it to the location by mistake, from Corbiere Ward, having left it in the pocket of his nurse's uniform.

Police Surgeon Dr. Michael HOLMES first expressed concern when he viewed the drugs recovered, in that a combination of insulin and potassium would be very difficult to detect in the body. Added to this, the amount of drugs in the possession of Mr. MAROLIA cast doubt on his account, in that he had several lethal doses of drug. If a person with a serious medical history were to be injected with the combination of drugs found in the possession of MAROLIA, the cause of death would not be clearly apparent. His possession of such drugs was therefore regarded as suspicious.

Enquiries have continued over the last three weeks, and have established that Mr. MAROLIA has had several affairs with either patients or relatives of patients at the General Hospital.

A disturbing disclosure was received from a nurse in the United Kingdom, which will be subject of comment later in this report. The evidence which gives rise to the suspicion that Mr. MAROLIA may have endangered the life of patients is as follows.

NURSE A

Nurse A in the UK, has disclosed in a statement recorded on the 6th May, 1999, that she had worked with MAROLIA in Corbiere Ward during 1997 and 1998. She was part of a team of three who were responsible for one of four sections on Corbiere Ward. MAROLIA, Nurse A and another male nurse, would work together. She was the more senior of the three, and had responsibility for assessing Mr. MAROLIA's performance. It should be stated at this stage, that this nurse is currently critically ill in hospital, awaiting a lung and heart transplant, and may die in the near future. She holds the view that MAROLIA was intent on terminating the life of very ill patients, and to support such a claim, she cites specific incidents.

Incident 1 - an elderly male admitted to Corbiere Ward (name unknown) suffered a heart attack which was further complicated when his insulin levels became abnormal. He was placed on a glucose drip, which is the normal procedure. The drip had been inserted correctly, and was working fine when Nurse A checked the patient on the previous evening in question. Nurse MAROLIA handed over to a nurse on the ward, just prior to Nurse A arriving for duty (the am. shift). On this occasion, MAROLIA had not worked with Nurse A and the normal team. As normal, the nurse checked on her patient and discovered, to her horror, that the glucose drip had been disconnected from the patient, and a bung put into the base, preventing the substance from leaking. The patient was unconscious and close to death. The nurse reconnected the drip and the patient recovered within about ten minutes.

Nurse A checked the patient's records and established that MAROLIA, who had been solely responsible for his care had, at about 07.00 hours, entered a blood/sugar reading of '0.3'. She states this would be regarded as dangerously low (confirmed as critical by Dr. HOLMES). The nurse confronted MAROLIA immediately, as he was still on the ward, and he explained that the patient must have moved and the drip disconnected. She, however, cannot accept this account, due to the bung being in place and the fact that the patient was unconscious. The nurse endorsed the patient's records accordingly, and reported her concerns to the Senior Nursing Officer Lesley HIGGINS.

The nurse alleges that HIGGINS disregarded the incident, in the hope that MAROLIA would shortly move to another position in the Accident and Emergency Department, and would therefore no longer be a problem.

The nurse checked the patient's records some days later and noticed that an entry had been inserted by MAROLIA which stated that, on discovery of a 0.3 blood/sugar level, the Duty Doctor had been informed. The nurse believes this to be a false entry on the part of MAROLIA and that the doctor had not been consulted.

By placing a bung in the drip, she is firmly of the view that this was a deliberate act aimed at ending the patient's life.

Incident 2 - A Mrs. [name excised] was admitted to Corbiere Ward at around Easter 1997, with liver failure. The son of Mrs. [name excised] confided in the nurse that MAROLIA had asked him why he bothered visiting, because his mother would be dead in the morning.

Mrs. [Name excised] died whilst on Corbiere Ward.

Incident 3 - Perhaps of greatest concern to Nurse A, was an incident in 1997, around the time Princess Diana died. Andrew MAROLIA had responsibility for a patient on the ward who was critically ill (name unknown). In the final days of the patient's life, the family attended upon the patient 24 hours a day. Nurse A was approached by a member of the family, who asked why MAROLIA would turn up the dose on the diamorphine pump during the evening and re-set it to its original setting, before the morning shift began. This rang alarm bells for Nurse A, who reported the matter to Lesley HIGGINS, who again did not take the matter very seriously. Dr. HOLMES holds the view that such action could result in the early termination of a patient's life.

Incident 4 - A young girl was admitted to Corbiere Ward, following an overdose. MAROLIA found her attempting to hang herself in the toilet on the ward. The patient was transferred to the APU, where it is alleged that the young girl disclosed to a member of staff that MAROLIA had offered to show her how to commit suicide correctly.

NURSE B

This incident occurred within the UK at Basingstoke Hospital. Nurse B was employed at the hospital and has disclosed in a statement, that she entered into a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship with MAROLIA during his one year attachment to Basingstoke Hospital. She explained that they had experimented with [sexual activities excised], with her permission. This had, however, progressed to MAROLIA becoming very violent, and he had on one occasion, thrown her over his shoulder and placed his knee on her chest, asking her if she wanted to die. She suffered a fractured sternum on this occasion. She alleges that the violence progressed to rape, and on one occasion, she was tied up on a table, naked, when he put a poker in the fire, took it out, placed it in water and ran it along her body at the time. Nurse B is very scared of MAROLIA, and she was spoken to by her line manager, after sporting a black eye and cut lip at work.

Basingstoke CID have been asked to undertake a thorough investigation of her allegations, which, on initial assessment, suggest the victim may have suffered over 20 incidents of rape.

NURSE C

Nurse C worked with Nurse A and MAROLIA. The nurse supports Nurse A's account of the detached glucose drip, and will provide a statement on Tuesday, 11th May, 1999. The early indications suggest that the allegation that the hospital authorities, in the form of Senior Nursing Officer Lesley HIGGINS, did not act correctly, are supported by Nurse C.

SENIOR NURSING OFFICER LESLEY HIGGINS

HIGGINS paints a picture of an over-confident Andrew MAROLIA, who was taken to task for answering the telephone on the ward, introducing himself as the Ward Manager, rather than the junior nurse that he was. She recalls a clash of personalities between Nurse A and MAROLIA, but has omitted to reveal important evidence. Firstly, she has not mentioned the incident described by Nurse A. In addition, she has failed to produce the written assessments on MAROLIA, when Nurse A placed her concerns on record, in writing. Nurse HIGGINS has stated that she misses MAROLIA, due to being short-staffed. Nurse HIGGINS regards the Police enquiries to date as an inconvenience.

HOSPITAL DEATHS

The Hospital Authorities, with the assistance of Senior Nursing Officer Jenny LE GALLAIS, have conducted a survey of deaths on Corbiere Ward, in conjunction with the duties of Andrew MAROLIA, from the 1st March, 1998, to the 31st March, 1999. The average death rate is 4.5 deaths per month, but evenly distributed between MAROLIA's duty time, rests days and annual leave.

In February, 1999, however, the records show a significant departure from this trend, and we see 8 deaths in four nights when MAROLIA was on night duty. In March, 1999, five deaths occurred, all during the duty time or the next morning when MAROLIA would have been on night shift. Such fluctuations could easily be explained by a serious bout of flu affecting frail or already critically ill patients, but equally it could be due to foul play.

POLICE SERVICE

The services of Andrew Charles MAROLIA were dispensed with by the States of Jersey Police in September, 1993, as a result of:
a) irrational behavior;
b) consistent failure to seek advice;
c) consistent failure or refusal to follow advice given;
d) regular indications of mistrust between him and his peers.
Due the lead-up to his dismissal, he was described as deceitful and sly.

MEDICAL ASSESSMENTS

Medical reports from Dr. Ian BERRY and Dr. VINCENT, the suspect's GP, indicate that MAROLIA has suffered from post traumatic stress syndrome linked to his service in the Gulf War. He suffered from depression in January, 1999, when he attended his GP. At no time has he given an indication of suicidal tendencies. The treatment for depression and the rise in deaths on Corbiere Ward during February, 1999, do give me cause for concern.

Mr. Richard WALTER

Mr. Richard W ALTER is a US Forensic Psychologist based at the Michigan State Prison. He has considerable experience in the field of offender profiling and visited Jersey to attend the International Police Surgeons Conference. Whilst in Jersey, I took the opportunity to relay the facts of this case to him. He confirmed my suspicions that MAROLIA possessed the hallmarks of a serial killer and that he was an extremely dangerous man. He found the sexual activities of MAROLIA to be of particular note and the threat to kill Nurse B, on the occasion that he allegedly broke her sternum, was an indication of the man's unhealthy interest in death.

BAIL APPLICATION

MAROLIA is due to reappear at the Magistrate's Court on the 19th of May, 1999, and a bail application is expected. He is currently held at St. Saviour's Hospital. The degree of security on Chausey Ward can only be described as poor.

CONCLUSION

Arising from the evidence above, I would recommend the following response from the States of Jersey Police.

I would advocate that this incident is broken up into two phases. Phase 2 should only be considered if significant evidence is uncovered during Phase 1.

Phase 1

The following action should be undertaken in pursuit of this case:

1) Recover all documents and appraisals from the Hospital in relation to Andrew Charles MAROLIA and patients mentioned in the statement of the nurses already interviewed.

2) Identify the patients referred to in the statement of Nurse A, and interview the relatives.

3) Identify and recover records of patients who died in February, 1999, and interview all relatives of such patients.

4) Identify and interview all past and present members of staff (46) in 1998.

5) Trace [name excised] reference possible sexual advances to her in Jersey by MAROLIA.

6) Re-interview Lesley HIGGINS in more depth reference the disclosures of Nurse A.

7) Identify all patients who were resident in Corbiere Ward in February, 1999, and during incidents referred to in the statement of Nurse A.

8) Identify and interview the female and members of staff reference the suicide attempt, including the hospital staff she disclosed to.

9) Engage a UK expert arising from a similar enquiry, to advise on this investigation.

10) Devise a press strategy.

11) Conduct an emergency conference with Hospital Authorities and request Senior Nursing Officer Jenny LE GALLAIS assists with the enquiry.

12) Commence a HOLMES incident room.

13) Seize drugs records on Corbiere Ward.

14) Invite Basingstoke CID to conduct enquiries into MAROLIA's activities whilst in post at that location.

15) Identify all friends in Jersey of Nurse A and interview them.

16) Record possible 'dying declaration' from Nurse A.

Dependent upon the results of Phase 1, Phase 2 may require the following action.

Phase 2

Consideration should be given to expanding this enquiry to all patients who died on Corbiere Ward during the term of office of Andrew MAROLIA. This should, in my view, only be considered upon receipt of all the information obtained in Phase 1.

COST IMPLICATIONS

I have attempted to assess the manpower implications of undertaking such a major enquiry, and they are attached to this report in the following folders, together with other relevant data:

Folder 1: Schedule of suggested manpower requirements re: Phase 1.

Folder 2: Survey of deaths between the 1st March 1998, and 31st March 1999.

Folder 3: Statement of Nurse A.

Folder 4: Police report of Detective Sergeant 202 Andrew SMITH re: the seizure of drugs at the home address of Andrew Marolia.

Barry Faudemer
Inspector – CID

Footnote (November 2010)
Stuart Syvret has been sentenced to 10 weeks' in jail for publishing the above on his blog. He has also been ordered to remove all references to Marolia from his blog.

Home to Something Evil

2009-03-15T21:49:00.003Z

The following article was published in The Guardian on 14 March 2009

Home to something evil

What really happened at Haut de la Garenne, the children's home at the centre of the Jersey care scandal last year? Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy report on a building that still houses some very dark secrets.

How Jersey's tourism bosses must have lamented the marketing slogan they chose last year: "Small enough to really get to know, yet still big enough to surprise."

It was supposed to mark a campaign to rejuvenate the holiday business.

Instead, it served to highlight a child abuse scandal that erupted on the island.

The story had first trickled out in November 2007, gaining almost no press attention. Following a covert police inquiry into allegations of mistreatment in the island's care homes, police and the NSPCC in London had appealed to former residents to come forward. By January 2008, hundreds were said to have made contact, reporting physical and sexual abuse, mostly at Haut de la Garenne, a grim, Victorian industrial school that had, until the mid-80s, served as Jersey's main children's home. Soon, Jersey was in the grip of one of the largest police child abuse inquiries seen anywhere in Britain.

How would the tiny island and its 88,000 residents hold up? They pride themselves on their traditionalism (the pound note survives here) and an independent spirit that locals refer to as the Jersey Way. The mantra, reflecting a closed community that knows how to look after itself, is credited with transforming the place from a bourgeois bucket-and-spade resort in the 50s into the oyster-shucking tax haven it is today. So potent is the lure of the island's low-tax, non-intrusive regime that the level of wealth required of prospective settlers has risen to stratospheric levels: only those who can pay a residency fee of about £1m and show assets in excess of £20m need apply. The lucky few include racing driver Nigel Mansell, golfer Ian Woosnam, broadcaster Alan Whicker and writer Jack Higgins, as well as hundreds of reclusive tycoons, who have made the island the third richest compact community in the world, after Bermuda and Luxembourg.

And then February 2008 arrived like a fist in the face. All anyone on the outside looking in could talk about was paedophiles. Then Jersey police announced they were investigating murder as well as complaints of physical and sexual abuse: witnesses said they recalled seeing the corpses of children at Haut de la Garenne; others claimed to have found bones buried beneath the foundations.

What made it worse for those on the inside was that the crisis had been started by an outsider, a Northern Irish copper called Lenny Harper, second-in-command of the island's police force, and the antithesis of the Jersey Way. Instead of managing bad news, Harper had teams of forensics specialists excavating for it. Every day, sitting on a granite wall outside the home, Harper regaled the world's press with stories that "something evil" had happened there - Haut de la Garenne had been a virtual charnel house. The first find was a sliver of human skull on 23 February. As the investigation progressed, the supposed tally rose to "six or more" bodies buried beneath the home.

By August last year, Harper had retired, to be replaced by a new policeman from the British mainland. More experienced than Harper, detective superintendent Mick Gradwell was a veteran whose cases included the deaths of 23 Chinese cockle-pickers at Morecambe Bay in 2004.

At his first press conference, on 12 November, Gladwell stunned reporters with his findings: "There were no bodies, no dead children, no credible allegations of murder and no suspects for murder." Only three bone fragments could be definitely said to be human, he said - and they dated from the 14th to 17th centuries. Newspapers ran gleeful headlines: "Lenny Harper lost the plot." By the time we arrived on Jersey in February 2009, a year after the digging had begun, it was as if Harper and his inquiry had never existed.

The Jersey establishment was triumphant. One of the island's most senior social workers expressed a view we were to hear many times: "I'm not saying all the former children's home residents are liars but some have misremembered," he said. "Some have embellished and a small number have been telling porkies to get money." Nothing was wrong with the island. Jersey was off the hook. It was all a cock-up.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Among the thousands of statements that still line the shelves of Harper's old incident room, and in the testimony of former residents and workers at Haut de la Garenne and other institutions across Jersey, many of whom we tracked down and interviewed, harrowing stories are buried.

Over a period of three decades, residents of the care homes made repeated complaints that they were being sexually and physically abused. A series of damning reports was produced, following confidential inquiries into these institutions, most of which went unheeded. Few prosecutions ensued.

It is true to say there were no corpses. However, the testimony provides compelling evidence of a catastrophic failure within Jersey's children's services that ran a regime so punitive, they preferred to lock up problem children en masse than deal with them in their own homes: four times more children, proportionately, are imprisoned in Jersey than in its nearest neighbour, France. And what happened to them once in care was something that Harper's team, had they not been distracted by murder plots, came close to exposing.

Harper clashed with the Jersey Way as soon as he was appointed head of police operations in 2002. A career officer, he had been office-bound for a few years and on Jersey he wanted to get back to real policing. Summing him up, one former Jersey colleague told us that Harper "was a bit of a pit bull" who found himself on a small island where discretion and subtlety were valued above all else. Early attempts at making his mark, including a clear-out of illegally held weapons and a curtailment of the often cosy relationship between local police and businessmen, made him instant enemies. Harper, who now lives in Ayrshire, told us: "I started getting death threats. But I'd been on the streets of Northern Ireland."

His most significant problem was recognising the limits of his power. Jerseymen trace their ancestry back to the medieval Dukedom of Normandy and a feudal culture survives. The island is divided into 12 parishes, each governed by a connétable or head constable, who between them raise a private volunteer police force, the Honorary Constabulary. It might sound like a toytown operation, but these so-called "hobby bobbies" form a network of neighbours, friends and relatives licensed to arrest and charge fellow islanders through powers vested in them by the 500-year-old States Assembly.

The assembly - made up of the connétables, their deputies and 12 elected senators, many of them multimillionaires - is supervised by the bailiff, Jersey's highest officer, who is appointed by the Queen, while the task of upholding the law and keeping the hobby bobbies in check falls to the attorney general. These two key posts are currently held by brothers, Sir Philip and William Bailhache, members of one of the oldest and most powerful families on Jersey. At the bottom of the heap are the 240 officers of the States of Jersey Police, imposed on the island in the 50s but even today requiring attorney general Bailhache's approval to charge anyone with anything more serious than a traffic citation.

It was a system that frustrated newcomer Lenny Harper, until he found an ally inside the attorney general's office. This was a mainlander who similarly mistrusted the Jersey Way and told Harper of a "web of child abusers" who he claimed all knew each other. He also alleged the attorney general's office appeared reluctant to prosecute. When we put this to William Bailhache, he replied that Harper had repeatedly suggested his office was "soft" on child abuse - this is untrue, he says, and so is the suggestion that he was reluctant to prosecute. "I have signed many indictments for people charged with child abuse offences, some of them historic. Several cases have resulted in substantial sentences of imprisonment."

Harper recalls: "I was cautious at first. The allegations reached into many worthy organisations, including the Sea Cadets and the St John Ambulance, and there were whispers about establishment men. One name that kept cropping up was Paul Every, a commanding officer in the island's Sea Cadets." Every had also served as a senior civil servant.

Harper dug around, discovering that Every's name had surfaced in connection with child porn offences during Operation Ore in 1999. In late 2004, Harper applied for a warrant to search the Sea Cadets' HQ. He was refused. Harper then contacted the Jersey Sea Cadets directly: "They completely ignored me and refused to sack Every." When the States Assembly, too, declined to act, and Harper received a message from the attorney general's office that it was reluctant to prosecute, Harper began to suspect a cover-up. He says, "What made things more fraught was that some of my own officers were in the Sea Cadets." (On this case, the attorney general comments: "It is absolutely not the case that I decided not to prosecute Every. It is true that one of my officials wrongly gave Mr Harper that impression.")

Harper pressed on, and in January 2005 had Every arrested and his home computer seized. On it, police recovered a cache of child porn and evidence that Every had scoured the internet for "naked sea cadets". Still unable to persuade the local Sea Cadets to act, Harper wrote in August 2005 to the youth organisation's national HQ in London, and finally Every was removed from his position. The following month, Harper arrested Roger James Picton, another Sea Cadet volunteer; Picton was found guilty of indecent assault on a schoolgirl in February 2006 and Every was convicted of child porn offences that December.

In early 2007, convinced there was a broad network of abusers operating on the island and mindful of Jersey's steadfast refusal to introduce a sex offenders' register, Harper began reviewing statements made by Sea Cadets who had alleged abuse. He discovered that many had been in care, especially in Haut de la Garenne. Calling up their care files, Harper found that a member of Jersey police's family protection team, Brian Carter, had been there before him. Carter was no longer in the force, but finding him on the island was easy. It turned out that in 2004 Carter had noticed an unusually high incidence of suicide among men who had passed through Haut de la Garenne. Reviewing the records of 950 former residents, he discovered that a significant number had complained of sexual and physical abuse, describing similar acts and perpetrators, going back to the 50s. Shockingly, even though supervisors at the homes had dutifully noted the complaints, none had been properly investigated.

Carter had sought out victims and taken statements detailing how they were allegedly beaten and raped by older children and staff, and also by Sea Cadet officers, St John Ambulance volunteers and at least one senator in the States Assembly. In April 2006, Carter handed the dossier to Jersey CID. Nothing happened.

Suspecting that allegations of crimes against hundreds of children were being brushed under the carpet, Carter quit the force in late 2006. Now, Harper alerted Graham Power, head of Jersey's police, to the dossier. Appalled, Power contacted the Association of Chief Police Officers which launched an independent inquiry, currently being handled by South Yorkshire. In September 2007, Power gave Harper the go-ahead to launch a full-scale child abuse investigation, with Carter re-employed as a civilian investigator. Together they set up an incident room at Jersey police headquarters in Rouge Bouillon, St Helier. Detective inspector Alison Fossey, another outsider, originally from Strathclyde, was called in to help sift through the first of 4,000 children's files.

Abuse claims were rife. Haut de la Garenne was at the centre; other child facilities on the island were also implicated, including a secure unit called Les Chenes and a "group home", Blanche Pierre. Harper ordered his men to find and interview as many victims as they could - something that proved difficult because several former care home residents had already spoken to Carter and were disillusioned when nothing came of it.

Fearful that his inquiry would collapse, it was then that Harper went public, making an appeal for witnesses to come forward, with the backing of the NSPCC. "I was summoned to the chief minister's office and given a rollicking," Harper claims. "CM Frank Walker told me, 'Stop calling these people victims. It's not proven yet. You can't say that. Do you realise what you are doing here can bring the government down?' " We tried to contact Walker, but he declined to respond.

A firestorm now swirled across the island. Harper recalls: "The NSPCC opened a helpline and the phones went haywire." Former Haut residents talked of being slammed into walls, punched and slapped. One victim from Les Chenes claimed to have been knocked out by a staff member and told police, "The supervisor put a foot on my chest and stood on me, screaming, 'This is what we do to scum like you!' " Former care home children also detailed sadistic sexual abuse, with residents raping their dorm mates and supervisors doing the same.

Dozens of potential protagonists were thrown up by the new inquiry, the same names having also been identified by victims in the Carter report. One of them, a former Jersey senator, Wilfred Krichefski, who died in 1974, was known as the "Fat Man" among Haut residents who accused him of multiple rapes. Other Haut victims claimed to have been "lent out" to men who took them sailing into international waters before forcing them to have sex - crimes thus committed outside Jersey's jurisdiction. Colin Tilbrook, a former headmaster at Haut de la Garenne in the 60s, was repeatedly named as having roamed the corridors at night with a pillow tucked under his arm with which to stifle the screams of the children he raped. Jersey social services had never investigated Tilbrook, who went on to secure a job in the early 70s on the British mainland. When news of the Jersey investigation became public, Tilbrook's foster daughter, by then in her 30s, came forward to reveal that he had repeatedly raped her when she was a child.

Like Krichefski, Tilbrook was dead, as were others accused, including Jim Thomson, the superintendent of Haut de la Garenne in 1979, who was repeatedly accused of abuse. It was the living that presented Harper's team with the knottiest problems. The list of those who had worked at the homes included the serving education director, Tom McKeon, and his deputy, Mario Lundy. Both were interviewed by police earlier this year; both vigorously deny any wrongdoing.

The inquiry was delivered a blow when, in January 2008, Harper's deputy, DI Alison Fossey, went to the mainland on a strategic command course. Fossey had a law degree and had worked in child protection for most of her career. She was a details person, while Harper had a more scattergun approach. In her absence, the investigation was transformed by lurid claims of bodies and murder. One police report from this time states, "Among the [Haut] victims were a few who said that children had been dragged from their beds at night screaming and had then disappeared." A local builder who had done renovations there in 2003 said he had found what he thought were children's bones and shoes. These items had been disposed of by the Jersey pathologist. Harper remained suspicious. On 5 February 2008, he flew to Oxford to take advice from LGC Forensics, a crime scene service used by forces across the UK.

Two weeks later, an LGC team encamped at Haut de la Garenne. A squad of technicians in white suits pored over the site. Central to it all were two sniffer dogs, Eddie and Keela, which Harper took to describing as his "canine assets". They were veterans deployed in the search for missing Madeleine McCann in Portugal, although the controversy caused there should have served as a warning to Harper. In Portugal, the dogs had crawled over a car used by Gerry and Kate McCann, and sounded the alarm. The Portuguese police then claimed that the McCanns had killed their daughter, when what the dogs had actually picked up on was both parents' legitimate proximity to death, working in hospitals.

At Haut de la Garenne, the dogs made straight for the place where in 2003 the builder said he had found bones. A senior police officer recalled, "They did cartwheels on the spot. And Harper went through the roof." As in Portugal, the dogs had smelled something but could not differentiate between ancient remains and a contemporary murder. But at 2pm on 23 February, caution cast aside, Harper called a press conference, telling reporters police believed that the partial remains of a child were buried there.

Over the following months, £7.5m would be spent sifting 100 tonnes of earth. By the time DI Fossey returned, there were 65 milk teeth, 165 bone fragments and two lime-lined pits dominating the inquiry.

Meanwhile the child abuse investigation, which had already identified 160 alleged victims, was, Harper claimed, taking flak. Harper was called to the attorney general's office after his team charged a former Haut warder with indecently assaulting underage girls at the home from 1969 to 1973. William Bailhache demanded that a lawyer appointed by his office be inserted into the inquiry to assess the evidence before any arrest or charges could be preferred - common practice on the mainland, he says.

The police sent the lawyer details of a further five suspects, including a former police officer and two couples. Hearing nothing for two months, Harper went ahead and arrested the 50-year-old former police officer on 12 June last year. The attorney general's lawyer had the man released the next day, citing a lack of evidence. Likewise he vetoed charges being laid against one of the two couples. That left only Jane and Alan Maguire, a couple now living in France, and their case, too, went nowhere.

Bailhache told us: "It would no doubt have been much easier for me personally if I had simply waved prosecutions through. However, had I done so I would have been failing in my duty... Actions on my part which Mr Harper no doubt interpreted as frustrating a prosecution were rather directed at ensuring that any prosecution which was properly brought had the best chance of succeeding."

In the end, Harper charged only two other individuals, both peripheral, one of whom, in a terrible irony, also claims to have been a child victim of abuse at Haut de la Garenne in the 70s.

Once Lenny Harper retired in August 2008, and the murder inquiry was discredited, some island officials were concerned that the investigation into the abuse allegations might collapse, too.

The alarm had been raised in 1979, following the death of a two-year-old at the hands of a foster parent. Two years later, visiting social workers David Lambert and Elizabeth Wilkinson, concerned that none of the proposed improvements had been put in place, launched a full-blown inspection. Their confidential report, taking a broader look at Jersey society, concluded that while the island was reinventing itself as a haunt for jetsetters, there was a neglected group afflicted by a "high incidence of marital breakdown, heavy drinking, alcoholism and psychiatric illness". These problems were exacerbated by a small island mentality that demanded everyone "conform to acceptable public standards".

Children rebelled in small ways: dropping litter, swearing, facing down the police, having parties on the beach. On Jersey, all of these "offences" were, according to Lambert and Wilkinson, often sufficient to get a child into serious trouble. And once children had come to the attention of the police, it was almost inevitable that they would enter Jersey's care home system. Without any provision for children to be bailed, most were incarcerated on remand, placed alongside children taken from their families, often for such reasons as "giving the mother a break". In this rural backwater, one in 10 children had been in care, a ratio far higher than on the mainland.

Once in care, the real problems began, with predatory residents, some with criminal records, bunked with the vulnerable. Cases were almost never reviewed; Lambert and Wilkinson found in one group of 65 children, 36 had remained invisible inside the system for more than 10 years. This was the more likely if parents made little fuss, or even, in some cases, left the island. One of the invisible told us how he had been incarcerated at Haut de la Garenne for being repeatedly sarcastic to the hobby bobbies; he stayed in care for eight years, he says, without ever seeing a trained social worker, during which time he claimed to have been raped by adults and fellow inmates alike.

At the time of Lambert and Wilkinson's visit, Haut was run by superintendent Jim Thomson. Like many then working in the Jersey care system, he had no professional qualifications. Thomson, who would be accused of sexual and physical abuse in Harper's 2008 inquiry, was found by Lambert and Wilkinson to have created a "highly unsatisfactory" environment that focused on corporal punishment for "boys aged 10 to 15", some of them locked in remand cells for days at a time. It was an institution ripe for abusers, especially at night when only one staff member was on duty for 45 children sleeping in four distant wings. Haut was "not suitable for any of the tasks in which it is currently engaged".

Nick (not his real name) was resident at the time. He told us he had been taken, aged 11, to Haut de la Garenne in "a large white van with bars on its windows" after his mother abandoned him in 1975. He said: "The dorm was at the end of a rabbit warren of corridors and consisted of eight hospital-style beds lined up against opposite walls. Most of the boys were in their teens and had been in the home for years." No sooner had he arrived than he was beaten up and his possessions stolen. "At night they would never come to check up on you. The younger boys would be tied down on their beds and raped by the older lads." He survived only because he was a boxer and he was allowed to stay with foster parents at weekends, a time when adults were said to come and prey on the children left behind.

According to the 1981 report, other homes caused concern, too, for their punitive regimes; chief among them was Blanche Pierre with its new house parents, Jane and "Big Al" Maguire. But the extent of the allegations against the Maguires would not be properly investigated for another 18 years. One of their former charges was Dannie Jarman, now 28, who moved into Blanche Pierre when her mother was diagnosed with cancer in 1985, ending up in a hospice. "I wasn't allowed to visit her," Dannie told us. "Two weeks after her funeral, I was told she was dead. I was repeatedly told that our mum hadn't brought us up right and had never wanted me." Other children later levelled accusations about the extremely harsh conditions.

No one would have known about it had Dannie Jarman not got drunk one night in 1998 and thrown a brick through the Maguires' bedroom window. When the Maguires called the police, former residents, including Dannie, were brought in for questioning. After they repeated their allegations of abuse, the police turned around their inquiry and charged the Maguires instead.

The then attorney general, Michael Birt, today the island's deputy bailiff, sought advice from counsel who suggested that while this home "might possibly have been one that was run on a somewhat Dickensian basis, the strict regime applied by the Maguires would have not been regarded as unusual in pre-politically correct times. Indeed it is quite likely members of the jury would have some sympathy for people who in order to instil a sense of discipline in their charges threaten to wash a child's mouth out with soap and water." The counsel suggested: "The evidence is extremely weak." Birt, who declined to comment when we approached him, dropped the charges. Following an internal inquiry, Jane Maguire was subsequently sacked by Jersey social services.

Another inquiry focused on Jersey's elite Victoria College after the head of maths was jailed for four years in April 1999 for indecently assaulting a pupil. In his report, Stephen Sharp, a former chief education officer for Buckinghamshire, criticised senior staff and school governors, who included bailiff Sir Philip Bailhache, for failing to act speedily or adequately. It had taken 15 years for the teacher to be caught and Sharp concluded: "The handling of the complaint was more consistent with protecting a member of staff and the college's reputation than safeguarding the best interests of pupils."

Haut de la Garenne eventually closed in 1986, Blanche Pierre in 2001, but when Kathie Bull, a British child behaviour expert, was called in the following year to inspect the island's children's services, she found the situation had worsened. So many children were now being locked up that the island's institutions operated a "hot-bedding" system to cater for them, which in the case of Les Chenes included children sleeping on a pool table. Discipline was meted out in The Pits, a punishment block consisting of four bare concrete cells. The island's youth justice system was backwards and brutal, Bull concluded, and she made 50 recommendations, including the establishment of a Children's Executive.

Four years later, when Simon Bellwood, a British social worker, was employed to close Les Chenes and move the secure unit to a new, purpose-built site, he was startled to find the old regime still in force: "I met children who spent months at a time, near naked, in bare, concrete punishment blocks." When he made public his concerns in 2007 - following a long-running dispute with some of the old regime who were still in positions of authority - he was sacked; the then health minister, senator Stuart Syvret, who had vocally championed those who alleged they had been abused, was voted out of office for his "intemperate and ill-considered statements in the assembly".

Two years on, Mick Gradwell's team is trying to pick up the pieces of the abuse inquiry. The attorney general has been handed evidential files against key suspects by the police, and says he expects to make his decisions in the next few weeks. Bellwood, Syvret and others are keeping up the pressure on Jersey's States Assembly, and lobbying UK justice minister Jack Straw to call a full, independent inquiry (the subject of a court hearing to be held in London next Tuesday). But, many of the victims of the care homes of Jersey are convinced that nothing can outflank an island establishment that often saw little wrong in what had gone before and is reluctant to embrace the future prescribed by the social work experts.

The guardians of the Jersey Way continue to thrive, such as the sprightly Iris Le Feuvre, elected to the States Assembly for almost 20 years, who as president of the education committee oversaw Haut de la Garenne, Les Chenes and Blanche Pierre during some of their most troubled times. Now retired, the 80-year-old, whose husband Eric was for years a hobby bobby, lives in St Lawrence parish. "Granny's coming," she shouts as an over-excitable Tibetan spaniel barks at the gate, and ushers us into her front room. Le Feuvre, who collected an MBE from Buckingham Palace in 2002, says of Haut de la Garenne: "It's been a terrible business. But mostly I feel for William and Sir Philip Bailhache. They've been through so much."

But what of the victims? She smiles: "Oh, such a fuss has been made. My father always used a belt on me. It did me the world of good."

Darwin and God

2009-03-12T18:33:00.003Z

Some Christians think the `Darwin Fish' (left) is insulting to Christianity.

Well if you're the sort of Christian who is insulted by that, perhaps you deserve to be! I think it is quite funny in an irreverant sort of way, and OK yes it is a parody of the popular Christian fish symbol, but it makes a serious point too.

Where did Darwin's wonderful and beautiful insights come from ultimately? Perhaps from God? Science and religion should not be seen as in conflict. Scientists unearth the `laws' of nature, but when we step back and marvel at their beauty and wonder why we are living in a world which is ordered by such principles we are on a religious quest.

Science does not attempt to explain where science comes from. But religion does. And Darwin can be seen as powerful evidence for the existence of a God.

The Seven Principles of Public Life

2009-02-25T09:03:00.005Z

In 1995 the UK Government published the report of the Nolan Committee on standards in British public life. The seven principles commended in this report speak for themsel

THE SEVEN PRINCIPLES OF PUBLIC LIFE

Selflessness
Holders of public office should take decisions solely in terms of the public interest. They should not do so in order to gain financial or other material benefits for themselves, their family, or their friends.

Integrity
Holders of public office should not place themselves under any financial or other obligation to outside individuals or organisations that might influence them in the performance of their official duties.

Objectivity
In carrying out public business, including making public appointments, awarding contracts, or recommending individuals for rewards and benefits, holders of public office should make choices on merit.

Accountability
Holders of public office are accountable for their decisions and actions to the public and must submit themselves to whatever scrutiny is appropriate to their office.

Openness
Holders of public office should be as open as possible about all the decisions and actions that they take. They should give reasons for their decisions and restrict information only when the wider public interest clearly demands.

Honesty
Holders of public office have a duty to declare any private interests relating to their public duties and to take steps to resolve any conflicts arising in a way that protects the public interest.

Leadership
Holders of public office should promote and support these principles by leadership and example.

These principles apply to all aspects of public life. The Committee has set them out here for the benefit of all who serve the public in any way.

Did they miss anything? Well, possibly. If these principles seem worthy, but perhaps a little dry, the concise inscription on the mace in the Scottish Parliament offers more in the way of humanity: Compassion, Wisdom, Justice, Integrity. Here I take `integrity' to be a kind of meta-principle that encapsulates all of the first six Nolan principles.

It is just possible that `principles' could be followed perfectly adequately but in a formulaic fashion, i.e. lacking the underlying values that would tend to make the practice of the principles spontaneous and natural. A key value surely has to be trust. A very clear description of trust is found in Mike Bottery's "Education, Policy and Ethics". He starts by outlining how trust can be a merely pragmatic value. Then he continues:

"Yet it is also something much deeper. It implies an attitude towards people and the world in general: a belief that things in the end turn out for good, that people are at bottom basically good as well. Some might see this as simple optimism, but however one views it, it has effects because of its spontaneity. It has the ability to create a similar trust in others, to foster friendship and love, simply to make life worth living. It cannot be artificially produced."

Nobody Came by Robbie Garner and Toni Maguire, a review

2009-02-13T07:30:00.014Z

Nobody Came
- the appalling true story of brothers cruelly abused in a Jersey care home -
by Robbie Garner with Toni Maguire.

Robbie Garner was taken into care in Jersey at the age of five following the catastrophic breakdown of his mother's dysfunctional relationship with her partner, his short life already blighted by callous maternal neglect. This would have been around 1960. Dates, like some other details, are not spelled out - the book is concerned with the emotional landscape its author endured, rather than attempting a documentary account.

With him to the Sacre Coeur orphanage went his three year old brother, Davie, while older brother John was dispatched to the Haut de la Garenne children's home, where Robbie was later to follow.

`Nobody Came' is the story of the horrific emotional, physical and sexual abuse Robbie experienced and witnessed in these two `care' establishments. He finally decided to tell the story he had kept buried for so many years when Haut de la Garenne hit the headlines in 2007 with allegations of decades of abuse. A disclaimer states that "in order to protect privacy, some names, identifying characteristics, dialogue and details have been changed . . . and the staff mentioned in this book are composite characters, drawn from the experiences of those whom the author remembers." No doubt this has also been necessary because of the ongoing investigation of historical abuse claims surrounding Haut de la Garenne, and the hope that perpetrators will eventually be brought to court.

Toni Maguire is herself an abuse victim whose bestselling works draw on her own tragic childhood. She is now helping other people to tell their stories and the chemistry here has worked to very good effect. The writing is a model of clarity. The story told in a direct and straightforward way is highly readable, moving - and deeply shocking.

Were the nuns of Sacre Coeur misguided religious zealots or manipulative abusers hiding behind the cloak of religion? The book simply tells the story of their barbaric cruelty and leaves the reader to wonder. But the sense of authenticity is enhanced by the young Robbie's sensitivity, even at such a tender age, to the occasional nun who appears troubled by the nature of the regime in which she too is trapped. One such is`Sister Claire', who to her eternal credit (composite character or not) finds ways to practise subversive acts of kindness.

On graduating to Haut de la Garenne, Robbie finds himself in a nightmarish world of casual brutality, where physical and sexual bullying is commonplace and where the depraved lusts of certain members of staff are given free rein in ritualistic orgies of abuse. Whether this extends to murder it is not possible to say, but there are unexplained disappearances, and one of Robbie's friends is driven to suicide. Robbie is acutely aware of the suffering of other boys (and in due course girls) and counts himself lucky that he is not pretty enough to become a `favourite'.

If Haut de la Garenne has a saving grace it is the quality of the food, so someone at least is doing the job they are paid for.

The sense of authenticity that pervades `Nobody Came', notwithstanding the disclaimer, is in stark contrast to the increasingly convoluted efforts of the Jersey establishment to sweep the whole Haut de la Garenne tragedy conveniently under the carpet. Their confident assertion that `there were no murders at Haut de la Garenne' would be laughable if it wasn't so serious. There may not be compelling evidence of such crimes, but that is very far from proof that no murder happened, especially when complete records of the children taken into care appear not to have been kept.

Happily, Robbie Garner has proved to be a survivor. His book too will survive. And it will continue to have a powerful and compelling voice for as long as justice for the victims of the Jersey care system remains elusive.

BBC Loses Plot on Gaza

2009-01-28T18:02:00.002Z

Had the BBC decided to broadcast the appeal for humanitarian aid for Gaza not many Palestinians would have been offended. Their so-called `neutral' decision not to broadcast looks therefore like a highly-politicised act designed to appease Israel and its supporters. In other words, in their misguided attempt to assert neutrality they have in fact created the impression of significant bias.

As for their feeble second excuse - that there were doubts about whether donated aid would get to where it was intended, that's like refusing to show the Greens party political broadcast on the grounds that they might not get many MPs!

Compassion and Hope for Jersey Victims

2009-01-18T20:09:00.008Z

I have extracted a sequence of related postings from Jersey Senator Stuart Syvret's blog which occurred over the 16th and 17th of January. Rather than just copy and paste, I have edited out those postings that seemed to be heading off in other directions (as blogs will do) in order to leave what I hope is a coherent thread. Many of the contributions are submitted anonymously. I have identified these contributors as Anonymous(1), Anonymous(2) etc. and have used this device to indicate where follow-up postings seem to have been made by an earlier anonymous contributor, though obviously I may have missed other instances. Oh, and I admit to correcting a few spelling errors because, well just because - it's something I do.

If you are in any way suspicious about the editing liberties I have taken, or just curious about what I have left out, I encourage you to visit the source, Senator Syvret's blog. You should visit it anyway -it is a shining beacon of light in the quest for truth and justice in the Kafkaesque world of Jersey politics. You will see below that on the evening of 16th January it reaches the milestone of 100,000 readers in just under a year, a remarkable indicator of the power of the people's media.

The thread is about child abuse. It includes contributions from a number of survivors of abuse in Jersey and elsewhere. It highlights the terrible dilemma of abuse victims in trying to decide whether to come forward with accounts of the horrific experiences they have buried for decades as a mechanism for survival. And it is marked by the collective and individual compassion of the contributors.

It starts with a desperately sad account from someone living in France.


My Life in France said...: A lesson too late for the learning (for me anyway)

Well here I am, in France and now very isolated. Many months ago, after much soul searching and advice given by my wife and GP , and against my better judgment I was persuaded to talk to the States of Jersey police who visited me here in France, with regard to my experiences whilst resident at Haut de la Garenne.

I had never, ever confided in anyone (not even my wife) before, and looking back now, as my family life lay in ruins around me, I wish it had stayed that way.

After the initial robust support I received from my soon to be ex-wife, I find myself once again alone, and locked into a time warp which like a fool and against all of my natural instincts I had re-opened the portal to.

An entrance way to an evil, hard and cruel world which had remained firmly closed and sealed for near on forty years.

As I write this, and, as I have done many times over the passing decades, I wish that my life experiences had been different.

When I was a child and I looked at my friends who all seemed to have normal, loving, and caring childhoods , I often wished that I could be them.

Just once, I used to think to myself. Just so I knew what it was like to wake up in a warm, clean, safe and loving environment where there were no bogymen.

An environment which in my very late life as a parent, I have tried so very hard to provide for my still so very young little girls.

However, you know the old saying about history repeating itself? Well, in my case it’s true. Having suffered the heart-break of a child who witnessed my father disappear through the front door with suitcase in hand.

I now find it’s my turn to leave. The stress that reliving my childhood experiences has put on me personally as an adult, can only be known by those who have suffered the deprivations and poverty that the Jersey system has encouraged century after century.

Up until recently, I personally believe that I had put my childhood nightmare world, of poverty, deprivation and abuse behind me. In fact, I know I had.

That is until I let others in. Others, who although well intentioned, had little or no idea as to the power of gene they were resurrecting from the dead.

Finding myself abandoned by those whom I thought cared, and for the health of my children, like my father before me, I am now packing my bags to leave. I love my little girls with all my heart, but have been left in little doubt to me that there is no longer room for me at this particular inn.

I wish that I had kept my dark and sinister secrets safely locked away. I believe, that had I not been so honest and frank about my childhood that, the personal catastrophe that I am now experiencing, and the hurt and the pain the my little girls will soon experience would have been avoided.

Perhaps there are those who should think very carefully before they start looking for the key to open the door - a door which may be better left firmly locked.
Senator Stuart Syvret said...: Your Life in France.

I found your story very moving.

My e-mail address is lower down. I think you should e-mail me so I can see if there is anything I can do to help.

Your life - which you had thought 'fixed' - has remained broken - or been broken - by having to revisit these terrible issues.

Tragedy upon tragedy.

Your story illustrates just how the consequences of child abuses do ruin so many lives.

Just how terribly damaging and difficult it is to overcome.

Which is why we must fight abuse - and speak out against it.

I know that must seem of very little comfort to you in your circumstances.

But I believe you did the right thing for the cause of fighting, exposing and attempting to prevent child abuse.

I know a number of survivors who, at times, have questioned whether they did the right thing by opening up to the police - especially after many complaints made in the past simply being ignored.

But the great majority of those I know ultimately decided that speaking out was/is the right thing to do.

Though having said that - I couldn't begin to describe the despair and devastation experienced by many survivors who - this time - finally - believed they were going to get justice - only to see the Jersey establishment attempt to character-assassinate the only two leaders the Jersey cops have ever had who took the abuse issues seriously.

This coupled with the obstructions to charging and prosecution we see by Bill Bailhache has also been very difficult to endure.

But - do not think for one instant that the war is lost.

It isn't. We're confident the court in London will ultimately decide that Mr. Straw has to look at the plain malfeasances of the administration of justice in Jersey.

But - for you personally - you sound as though you need support at this difficult time. Are friends and family helping you?

Would it help to speak with Ray of the NSPCC, who has been based in Jersey for the duration?

My e-mail address is:

st.syvret@gov.je

Please e-mail me directly - and I'll see if there is anything I can do to help.

Be strong.

Stuart.
Zoompad said...: Dear `My Life in France',

I really felt for you as I read your post. I was in a similar situation with my fiancee, recently.

When the Haut de la Garenne story first broke, it opened up everything inside me once more - although I was one of the Staffordshire Pindown children, not Jersey. My friends and fiancee saw me fall apart - I was also being dragged through the secret family courts, it was a terrible time. I thought that my relationship would be smashed up - it seemed like it would not survive - I made my fiancee cry because of all the hurtful things that I said to him - the poor man, the only person I felt that I could safely shout at was him, and so I did, and cried and made his life like hell for a while. All that anger and hurt had to come out somewhere, and my lovely man took the full force of it. One day, I realised that we were breaking up - he just couldn't take any more of it, it was making him ill, and so I prayed, I lay on the floor and asked God to help me. And I decided there and then that we were NOT going to break up, they were NOT going to smash me up any more, and God would NOT allow me to be hurt any more.

I don't know if me writing this will help you at all, I really wish I could say something, but I will say this : I thought that my fiancee was thinking things about me that were not true - I thought that he would be better off without me, but that is not true, I had somehow convinced myself that he did not love me any more, and that certainly was not true. We had a long talk - a quiet talk, with no crying or shouting, about these things, and then we asked God to keep us safe. I was so wrong about my fiancee's feelings, he does love me, very much, but in all the shouting and crying how could he express it? How could I know what he was feeling?

In my experience, women don't fall out of love so very easily as you might think, especially if there are children to remind you of the man you once loved. I know a lot of women, and we are not as fickle as men might think we are. A person might mistakenly think that love has died, when all that has really happened is that love is hidden behind a dark cloud. I don't know if this is any help, please ignore it if it isn't.

Zoompad
Anonymous said...: Life In France

I too had a difficult childhood and can totally empathise with you in wishing for what other children appeared to have,,,,but I didn't,,,,,,,,,,,in adulthood my husband left my and our child....and I felt totally alone and worthless once more...an only child myself I had no one to turn to..........I have put it all in a box in my mind now and I don't talk about it, my story is tragic but I survived it all.

What got me through the tough times of reflection was actually talking about it with friends and acquaintances - and I can tell you that it is crucial that you do that - so take any help in that area that you can get ...you may be surprised how much strength you will get from that and then you too may be able to put the past back in the box.

You were brave to open up and by doing so you have helped others, do not be too hard on yourself. Good luck.
Proud Survivor said...: Life in France

Leaving your little girls is not the answer for you or for them because how ever hard you try you can't leave your troubles behind - they travel with you.

When the news broke last February, I agonised for months before coming forward and would have had a total breakdown if I had not found a wonderful counsellor who has helped and supported me through this. I agree with Stuart that you need someone who is trained and experienced in this area to talk to. If you go on the BACP website you may find details of English counsellors living in France.

Like you I had lived with my memories of HDLG for over 40 years and none of my family were aware that I had been in there as none of them lived in Jersey and my mother had cleared off after leaving me there and she died over 20 years ago. Since I made my statement I have gradually managed to tell my family and my friends and the support I have received has been amazing. My partner and my grown-up children have been distressed to know what I experienced but it has made us closer than we have ever been.

I do not regret coming forward although I am angry and frustrated by the delays. coverups and distortions of the truth that have followed.

One thing I do know is that whether children died or not in HDLG, there was savage physical abuse that I witnessed; emotional abuse that damaged my self-esteem and that of countless children and sexual abuse that cannot be denied. I wonder how some people can live with themselves and some must be spinning in their graves!

There is lots of support for you here and although I stay anonymous to protect myself and those I love, I would willingly communicate with you by email through Stuart if you wish.

This is definitely not over and I really hope we will all meet up for a big party when justice is finally done!

Proud survivor
Life in France said...: Zoompad & anon. You both talk a lot of sense! Thank you

From France
Anonymous(2) said...: Life in France

I dont often comment on here but my heart goes out to you fella - youve been let down badly twice by Jersey and I hope some of the spineless bastards who continue to cover up this child abuse will one day be exposed...but lets not hold our breath eh?.

Please dont blame your coppers because the lower ranks can only do so much mate,especially since your AG is doing such a good job(if you catch my meaning!)-the whole establishment here is tainted and I sometimes wonder how far up the rot actually goes?

You are not alone in having your life shattered yet again by the "Jersey system"-believe me!.

Ah well-time for an exit back to my housing estate "oop north"-the air around here is a little ripe for me!..Good luck to you fella.

J'ai espoir mieux avoir!.
Anonymous(3) said...: It's a shame nobody is commenting on who is responsible for unearthing those of us who kept it closed up and were forced to release the demons to satisfy their politcal agenda.
Spinless eh?
Anonymous(4) said...: Re: Life in France

You have more support than you yet know. When Lenny Harper left, many of us predicted the officials would succeed in covering up all he had brought to light.

But, just look at the numbers on this blog. Stuart has about 100,000 new individuals who have read it, and many of us follow the blog regularly. Lenny continues to support the Jersey victims and refuses to be silenced. Stuart never backs down in his defense of justice and truth for victims.

Truth just has a way of pushing its way out past the frantic spin of the Warcup handlers and house rag. Now books are already being published with stories of survivors of HDLG. More will be written, and officials will be named.

You will not be alone in this.
Newfan said...: Senator,

Just wanted to send you warm wishes and congratulations from USA readers who support your efforts on behalf of abused children. Your blog has become truly global and will continue to grow in influence, as it should.

- Newfan
Senator Stuart Syvret said...: Unearthing the Past

I’m very sorry you feel that way. I know such things are immensely difficult – I’ve come to know many survivors.

But nearly all of those I know feel they have done the right thing.

For some – confronting the past and opening up has been a deeply debilitating experience – for all kinds of reasons – but most people tell me they have found new strength and purpose in fighting this evil.

All any of us can do – is to do what we think is right under the circumstances. And I have had no doubt that fighting this battle was the right thing for me to do.

At risk of repetition, as I’ve explained the chronology of events many times before – it was not me who chose to make this whole episode a “political” issue.

As the rock-solid evidence shows – as the chronology demonstrates – it was Frank Walker and the rest of his Council of Ministers who chose to use the child protection failures in order to further their “political agenda” against me – back in the summer of 2007 – when they thought they could carry on the concealing once they’d got rid of me.

And the issues I discovered initially didn’t relate to HDLG – but far more recent – indeed, contemporary - failures. The HDLG investigation was a police exercise.

I respect your opinion – but have to disagree with it – not least because many other survivors tell me they’re relived the subject is finally being confronted, and hope that children will be better protected in future.

I share their views – and if that be a “political agenda” – so be it.

Stuart.; Need I say more?
Anonymous(5) said...: People can run but they can't hide. The truth will come out eventually and those responsible will become known. Just as with the Occupation the truth will come
out eventually. Let us hope that justice is done before it is too late for those affected.
Anonymous(6) said...: "It's a shame nobody is commenting on who is responsible for unearthing those of us who kept it closed up and were forced to release the demons to satisfy their politcal agenda.
Spinless eh?"

Jerseys welfare policies are flawed and continue a long tradition of the "Jersey way" being preferred over U.K. practices.

If the Greenfields and HDLG abuses had not come to light they would have been repeated for decades in various forms.

Playing down the abusive practices for "the good of the island" allowed the abusers free rein and immunity.

So please, no more of this "you're only hurting people" bullshit.

Changes are happening as we speak and children in the States care are safer than they have been for decades thanks to Stuart and Lenny Harpers efforts.
Anonymous(7) said...: 100,000 achieveat 21 43
Anonymous(8) said...: In the end honesty is the best policy
Senator Stuart Syvret said...: 100,000 + of you.

What can I say?

Thanks, really, for taking an interest.

Supporting the child protection campaign.

And providing what has frequently been a great source of support to me - during what has, at times, been a cold, hard battle.

I missed the actual counter click - but hell - I was watching Miles Davis on YouTube - playing the song 'Time After Time' - live.

Just sublime. Check it out.

Thanks

Stuart
Anonymous(3) said...: Yes you are right - confronting the past CAN work for some people, however the professional advice is that it's often not a good idea.

The point I was making is that this has FORCED the issue for many people (as evidence by your poster from France) and THAT IS very damaging and is destroying families who were coping.

Yes, facing it is necessary for some - the CHOICE would be nice.
Anonymous (9) said...: "The point I was making is that this has FORCED the issue for many people (as evidence by your poster from France) and THAT IS very damaging and is destroying families who were coping.

Yes, facing it is necessary for some - the CHOICE would be nice."

Do you HONESTLY believe keeping a lid on things would be better?

By confronting the abusive behaviours and institutions children now and in the future are being saved from mistreatment and suffering.
No one else will need to have to make a choice because the abusers will be stopped.

Or maybe murders shouldn't be investigated so the bereaved families wont be distressed.
Anonymous (3) said...: Unearthing the past

I was not suggesting that the issues should not gave been unearthed. I was saying the manner in which it was done, with all the attendant politics and media spin, has made it impossible for people who wanted to keep the past where it belonged for them.
Anonymous (10) said...: Sadist abusers (they are sadist however you look at it) prefer their crimes (and they are crimes) to be kept secret and will seek out environments and others that allow them to practice their sadist tendancies.

They must be brought to account for their crimes against humanity otherwise it is sending out the message that any and every depraved act goes - as long as you have the right people protecting you.

Many people simply do not want to beleive that these acts of depravity occur and will simply bury their heads in the sand rather than to have to accept the full and horrific implications that some 'humans' are beyond comprehension.
Anonymous (11) said...: "people who wanted to keep the past where it belonged for them."

If you try to deny or ignore painful abuse in the past it has a funny habit of coming back and biting you in the bottom when you least expect it! It could be the sight of a building,the smell of a type of floor polish, the sound of footsteps in a corridor or the feeling of being locked in a room.

Flashbacks can be visual, auditory or sensory and for some they don't go away until you have told your story to someome who really listens to you and affirms your pain.
: My life in France said

I’d just like to thank all of you that have written so many kind words to me.

You have all shown through your kindness to me, that the world could be such a very different place if we just all reached out to those in need.

Yesterday, when I posted `my life in France’ I was feeling pretty low. Today, although still very much alone, sad, and coming to terms with what looks like the inevitable as far as my personal life is concerned. I still see a glimmer of light in the darkness that surrounds me.

This light is kindled, by those of you who have held out a hand of friendship, kindness and understanding to a complete stranger. And what’s more, a stranger in need.

Yesterday, after posting on Stuarts blog, I received a telephone call from a very understanding lady at the States of Jersey Police. Who, offered all of the help that is at the disposal of the SoJP.

Similarly, Stuart has been in contact, again offering me all the support and help that he can muster.

If I had not realized it before, I certainly do now. That is, through the kindness and fellowship that you all have shown to me, the world could be such a very different world if we just held out our hands to someone in need.

Like many of you, I have young children, two beautiful little girls. I, am in my early fifties and, at times am very frightened for them.

I’m frightened because of the world we live in, a world which has made men like Stuart, Lenny and many others who contribute to this blog, indispensable in the fight against the darkness which is waiting around every unlit corner for the unwary innocents to step into.

I know now, that perhaps there is more hope for us then I had realized before. Yesterday proved to me that total strangers, regardless of race, religion or gender can embrace a fellow human being who is in need.

It demonstrates not only regarding my fears for my own little girls, but with regard to all of those who are in pain and all of those who have experiences abuse and injustice, that there are some very extraordinary human beings who without being asked will take your hand in kindness.

Thank you for being there.
*****************************************************************************

"If I had not realized it before, I certainly do now. That is, through the kindness and fellowship that you all have shown to me, the world could be such a very different world if we just held out our hands to someone in need."

This sums up very well, I think, the power for good that this kind of online fellowship can be. My thought go out to `My Life in France' and I very much hope he is beginning to see some light at the end of the tunnel, through the support that has been forthcoming as a result of his contact with the blog.

New Year Message to Senator Stuart Syvret

2009-01-02T17:03:00.003Z

Happy New Year Stuart

I have been following your blog closely and have posted occasional comments since the middle of last year.

I discovered your blog in a roundabout way. Although I never knew him, I came to know a little about the late Dereck Carter - former Tourism Minister on Jersey - through contacts in France, and was impressed by what I heard about his reforming and principled approach to politics. Then I discovered the tribute to Dereck on `Is This Jersey?', written by Greg Matthews, in which he described Dereck as having "more principle in his little finger than the whole gang of talentless amateurs and lowlife gangsters who ran the States when he was active and still run the States now".

This further intrigued me, and as the Haut de la Garenne investigation became an ever higher profile story in the national media, I began to wonder whether in some way there might be a connection between an apparent history of child abuse on the island stretching back decades and a tradition of government by a largely unaccountable and possibly corrupt establishment clique. Having made that tentative connection, it was not long before I found the blog of Senator Stuart Syvret!

Not only was I astonished by the forthrightness of what I read, and by your honesty, persistence, compassion, courage and high principles, I also soon realised there were other powerful voices such as Voiceforchildren, Linda Corby and Simon Bellwood, using blogs as a means of political expression in Jersey. I have searched for a similar online community in my native Scotland, and despite it being a time of great constitutional and financial uncertainty here, have found nothing similar. So I concluded that there must be something special - indeed unique - about the situation in Jersey, and over the months you have obliged by demonstrating in forensic detail just what this is.

As an outsider, some would say I have no business even taking a distant interest in the private tribulations of a small rich island. Here is my justification: you are absolutely right to say that highly paid public servants with a responsibility for child protection must discharge their duties, but in normal modern democracies this duty of care is the explicit responsibility of EVERY adult. As global citizens this translates to a responsibility to notice abuses of power wherever they may occur and to do whatever we can to support the cause of justice.

Of course this is not always easy, as this beautiful song by Natalie Merchant of 10,000 Maniacs eloquently illustrates; and it is the people of Jersey who will be called upon to make the hard decisions, not the armchair altruists like me!

Anyway all the best for 2009, starting with your date with Jack Straw, and know that support for your tireless efforts and for the cause of the Jersey victims extends to many places well beyond your island's shores.

Uruisg

Creationism and the Stork Theory of Reproduction

2008-12-23T13:43:00.001Z

The Guardian today (23/12/08) reports that in an Ipsos/Mori poll* of teachers in England and Wales 29% of science specialists agreed with the statement: "Alongside the theory of evolution and the Big Bang theory, creationism should be taught in science lessons."

The newspaper has also published a response to this alarming news from Richard Dawkins:

"The 'Michael Reiss position' is defensible. Just as a chemistry teacher might discuss the phlogiston theory, or a physics teacher might discuss the Ptolemaic theory of the planets as history of science, so it is defensible to teach that there are people called creationists, and they believe what they believe.

But if teaching creationism 'alongside' evolution means what it seems to mean, it is no more defensible than teaching the stork theory alongside the sex theory of the where babies come from.

If 29% of science teachers really think creationism should be taught as a valid alternative to evolution, we have a national disgrace on our hands, calling for urgent remedial action in the education of science teachers. We are failing in our duty to children, if we staff our schools with teachers who are this ignorant – or this stupid."

Perhaps, to be charitable to these teachers, they have not been challenged to think about the issue of creationism, and the unexpected requirement for an instant response has caused them to take refuge in some woolly instinct to appear inclusive. Whether or not creationism presents the same threat to the rational, ethical pursuit of science in this country as appears to be the case in the USA, our science teachers should be challenged to think about it. If only because the discipline may sharpen their understanding of what science is. So Dawkins is right in calling for urgent remedial action.

* poll of 923 primary and secondary teachers conducted between 5 November and 10 December - results statistically weighted by sex, age and teaching phase to the known profile of primary and secondary school teachers in England and Wales.

Sun, Sea and Satan

2008-12-12T19:19:00.009Z

I have just watched "Sun, Sea and Satan : Haut de la Garenne, Jersey, An Uncensored Cutting Edge Adult Documentary by Award Winning Film Director Bill Maloney".(www.pienmashfilms.com)

Bill appears as the presenter/director, and he makes it clear from the start that he is driven by anger. His reaction to the Haut de la Garenne allegations is emotional and deeply personal. I suspect the film may have only a peripheral role in the cause of justice for the victims, as it does not attempt to provide a body of rigorous evidence. Instead, his approach is based on the belief that `sometimes simple things can betray everything', and this brings some moments of devastating directness.

Nowhere is this clearer than in his repeated visits to a little shrine of ornaments in the garden of a very comfortable looking bungalow. Including both human and animal forms, this display - openly sited beside a busy road - could at a casual glance be taken for a quirky take on the nativity scene. But nothing could be further from the truth: one of the `ornaments' is a larger-than-life statue of a very young child with an enormous phallus in his/her mouth.

This is quite clearly 3-dimensional child pornography and surely illegal. I cannot imagine this happening anywhere in the UK without public disgust and legal action. Yet here in Jersey the owner is happy to flaunt his sickening display in a defiant statement that says, "I am untouchable." Maloney is blunt about what he would like to do to the person responsible, but does not reveal their identity. The house, though, he names as `Charnwood'.

As if this were not shocking enough, the film demonstrates that the house is a mere two minutes' drive from Haut de la Garenne. This little piece of public paedofilia has been on blatant display throughout the investigations at the former children's home, and barely a mile away. Investigating officers and members of the public must have passed it on a daily basis. Truly it beggars belief. It is a terrifying cameo that speaks volumes on how it may have been possible for a culture of abuse to have existed on the island for decades.

Jersey Again - Watch this Space

2008-12-04T07:22:00.000Z

So why would the Jersey establishment be hell-bent on obstructing investigation into Haut de la Garenne? The recent evidence-free press conference to smear the investigatve efforts of retired cop Lenny Harper has allowed them to trumpet to a naive media, "No murders here!" I suspect this may be a prelude to "nothing very much happened here at all - and anyway it was all a long time ago" . Never mind that 200-odd people have provided statements alleging abuse.

Chief Minister Frank Walker is mainly famous for claiming that those campaigning for justice were "shafting Jersey internationally". This may be taken to imply that Senator Walker is frightened that the investors on which Jersey's tax haven economy depends will be scared off by the association of the island not just with sea and sun but also sex abuse. Who's kidding who? Don't imagne that the mega-rich tax-avoiders who pour money into Jersey give a shit about the health of the island's social services, past or present. Mired in self-interest, these people will invest in any regime that can provide the right financial terms and an opportunity to cover their tracks.

No, at the risk of being labelled a conspiracy theorist, there simply must be some other reason. I have no idea right now what this might be and I was about to add, "Watch this space."

But better still, watch this space. Or if it turns out that the Jersey oligarchs are able to silence legitimate dissent, watch this one.

Jersey Politicians are Behind the Smears

2008-11-18T17:32:00.000Z

The Jersey media adopts a staunchly - at times stridently - pro-establishment line. Think Pravda and you won't be far away. However, free speech may be in a healthier state in neighbouring Guernsey where the local paper gave Lenny Harper (now declared a non-person by the Jersey media) the chance to put his case:

From the Guernsey Press, 17 November 2008

‘Jersey politicians are behind the smears’

By Nick Mann

Former Jersey deputy police chief Lenny Harper this week found himself the target of accusations that he mishandled the Haut de la Garenne inquiry, stoking speculation about murders – the possibility of which has been ruled out by his successors. Speaking to the Guernsey Press’s Nick Mann from his Ayrshire home, Mr Harper claims he is the subject of a politically-motivated smear campaign

Do you feel you are being made a scapegoat by the Jersey authorities and/or Jersey police and if so why?

The States of Jersey Police is a professional and dedicated organisation. I have an extremely high regard for all of the officers and staff who were there when I was in the post.

Of course, I believe that this smear is politically motivated.

This has been an ongoing situation from the day the inquiry went public when the chief minister [Frank Walker] told me that I was in danger of bringing the government down, tried to admonish me for speaking to a politician who was representing victims and tried to force me to take the word ‘victims’ out of my media releases as ‘they are not victims until something is proved’.

Furthermore, I have been approached now by four journalists in the past 24 hours who tell me they have been questioned by police officers appointed by [Jersey deputy police chief] David Warcup and asked if I have leaked documents to them.

This refers to the report which I sent to the Attorney General in Jersey which was critical of him.

The efforts to smear me contrast markedly with the lack of effort which Frank Walker put into investigating the leak of an email by one of his ministers to a journalist after the SOJP [States of Jersey Police] made a formal complaint.

Both the minister and the journalist denied it, but the journalist’s admission was recorded on the publicly-known system at PHQ. That, and the timing of the release last week, which actually said nothing I had not said previously, give obvious clues.

If you are in any doubt that some months ago I was saying that the bones could be very old and that we might never be able to launch a murder inquiry, go to the BBC News website and go into the link of 31 July at 1756 UK time which features an article headlined ‘Jersey Murder Inquiry Unlikely’.

In that I am quoted as saying that if the evidence remains the same it is obvious there will not be a murder inquiry. This is vastly different to what Warcup inferred yesterday [Wednesday 12].

Do you regret the information you put out during the investigation or do you stand by it and feel the situation has been misinterpreted?

I stand by it and feel it has deliberately been misrepresented.

Was there enough evidence to dig up Haut de la Garenne and what was it?

The reasons for going in there are fully documented in a report on the SOJP website - unless it has been removed. Basically, witnesses were telling us of remains in the location and there was a local solicitor who said he had a client who would confirm the presence of a child’s remains.

We did not go into the home to dig, but to screen the area to try and prove the suggestions one way or another.

This was after a meeting in the UK with experts in the areas of search, anthropology, archaeology, canine recovery and scientific search methods and a desk top study by the leading scientist of a forensic science company.

There was close consultation with the National Policing Improvement Agency. It was only after we started to recover evidence and builders who had worked at the home were telling us that they had been told to burn bones and let bygones be bygones that we started to dig.

Who did you report to? Was there strong enough political oversight of the investigation? Did you make it clear to the Home Affairs minister or the chief minister that the evidence may not prove to be conclusive and when?

The Home Affairs minister [Senator Wendy Kinnard, who subsequently stood back because she was interviewed as a potential witness in the historic abuse inquiry} was totally supportive.

The political oversight of the inquiry was appropriate at her level. The degree of political interference from others masked as oversight was intolerable.

One bizarre aspect was the fact that the two politicians responsible for child safety showed no interest in the inquiry whatsoever other than to try and rubbish it.

Several months ago Frank Walker brought his wife to the scene for a tour. In her presence, and that of some of my team, I told him that he had to prepare for the fact that there would probably never be enough evidence to launch a homicide inquiry.

He put his hand on my shoulder and said that would be no bad outcome, but he was sure I would do what I had to do.

The Home Affairs minister was being closely briefed and she was strongly supportive.

How many officers were working on the investigation and did any of them voice concerns?

There were roughly 50 officers from the UK and Jersey working on this. The team morale at that time was superb.

UK officers were reluctant to leave the inquiry and all had a shared sense of purpose.

They fully supported what the team were doing. Not one of them ever expressed any concerns.

When did you find out the ‘fragment of child’s’ skull was probably coconut?

Again, I have fully explained this. The lab who had the fragment had it for three weeks and reported to us referring to the item as ‘the Jersey skull’.

Firstly they said the bone was too old or too degraded to date. They then reported that they had found collagen in the item, a substance only found in mammals, not wood or coconut.

They then changed their stance again saying that the collagen was too degraded to date.

They then, and only then, said they were no longer sure it was bone.

They added in response to a question from me that if I wanted it definitively identified I would need to have it examined again.

They have never answered my other question which was how they had found collagen in it.

By this time however, the item had been ruled out of the inquiry because our experts had said that the context it had been found in dated it before our inquiry.

All of this was ignored by Warcup on Wednesday.

Are the Jersey authorities deliberately trying to divert attention from Howard League report?

That is a possibility strongly put to me by a number of ex colleagues and journalists.

Have you been contacted by the Met Police who carried out the independent investigation into the inquiry? If not, does that cast doubt on its findings and why?

The Met have arranged to come and speak to me in a week’s time. There has been no other contact. I would be surprised if they had delivered any conclusion to Jersey before speaking to myself.

Have you met David Warcup or [Detective Superintendent] Mick Gradwell since they took over? if so when?

Journalists have told me that Warcup inferred on Wednesday that we had. This is nonsense. There has been no contact since I left the island other than a letter from Warcup advising me ‘of my public duty and for the good of the victims, not to speak to the media’.

Jersey police chief Graham Power has been suspended and you stand by him why? And will you be prepared to defend him as part of the disciplinary process?

Graham Power has been an outstanding chief officer. Under his leadership, an abundance of local talented officers at all levels have prospered.

The HMI has delivered glowing inspection results in marked contrast to those before he arrived.

He has taken a firm stance against corruption, inappropriate behaviour, and, most of all, has fought a long battle against political interference in the operational tasks of the force. I will do anything I am asked to do on his behalf.

Will Wednesday’s announcements affect abuse victims in terms of coming forward to the Jersey authorities and why?

They did not trust the authorities previously and this will make it worse. The view expressed to me by several victims in the past 24 hours is that yesterday was politically motivated as was the suspension of Graham Power. One victim said it is back to the bad old days. Speak to Stuart Syvret.

Is there anything else you want to add?

No. Other than to say that the victims and the people of Jersey were badly served on Wednesday by the blatant misrepresentation of my views and things I had said. They made it appear as if they were contradicting me. In reality, they were saying nothing new.

Article posted on 17th November, 2008 - 2.28pm

Gracious Words from an Astounding Source!!

2008-11-09T15:54:00.000Z

Amongst the many tributes paid to Barack Obama on his election this week, you may have heard this:

"No matter how they cast their ballots, all Americans can be proud of the history that was made yesterday. Across the country citizens voted in large numbers. They showed the watching world the vitality of America’s democracy and the strides we have made towards a more perfect union. They chose a President whose journey represents a triumph of the American story – a testament to hard work, optimism and faith in the enduring promise of our nation. Many of our citizens thought they would never live to see that day. This moment is especially uplifting for a generation of Americans who witnessed the struggle for civil rights with their own eyes - and four decades later, see a dream fulfilled….

It will be a stirring sight to watch President Obama, his wife Michelle, and their two beautiful girls step through the doors of the White House. I know millions of Americans will be overcome with pride at this inspiring moment that so many have awaited so long. I know Senator Obama’s beloved Mother and grandparents would have been thrilled to watch the child they raised ascend the steps of the Capital and take his oath to uphold the constitution of the greatest nation on the face of the earth."

It is one of the astonishing effects of the election that these gracious words came from none other than George W Bush. Wonders will never cease! I could never have envisaged ending the week with, for the first time ever, just a little respect for the man.

You can see the Bush speech here and read the full text here.

Creationism is not Science

2008-11-08T12:24:00.000Z

The business of science is to constantly refine our theories about the world in the light of evidence. The best theory is the one that best accounts for the evidence, rigorously obtained. No scientific theory is the final word on the matter: it is simply the best current explanation for what has been observed. No scientific theory can be proved to be true, but it can be shown to be inadequate - wrong, if you like - by the production of counter-evidence. All science has to be potentially disprovable.

As new scientific understanding emerges, competing theories may also emerge. It is the proper business of science to design experiments to put these theories to the test in order to discover flaws. This in turn leads to the least flawed theory prevailing as the latest provisional explanation.

The reason why creationism cannot be taught as science - as if it were a theory in direct competition to evolution - is that it is not a scientific theory at all. Followers of creationism cannot define what evidence they would accept as disproving their `theory'; doubtless for some even to ponder on this would be to doubt their faith, akin to sacrilege. For them, creationism is simply not disprovable.

On the other hand, there is no reason not to discuss creationism in a science lesson. It provides a very clear illustration of what is and what is not science, and can therefore serve to further the understanding of the nature of scientific progress.

This is not to say that fundamentalist religious belief - such as creationism - is not an important topic of study in its own right. This is particularly the case given the threat that fundamentalism in its various modern world forms poses to enduring shared values such as tolerance, moderation and compassion. But its proper place lies within the teaching of religious education, sociology and psychology, not in science.

Footnote: in the same way, should we need to study the`Church' of Scientology it should be considered within business education, as an example of a successful ethically corrupt money-making scam, not as a religion.

Jersey Bloggers near to Tipping Point in Media War?

2008-10-25T15:35:00.000+01:00

Lately I have been closely following the situation in Jersey. By this I mean I have been reading Senator Stuart Syvret's blog, because this appears to be the ONLY reliable source of information on the island. If you don't know what I mean by the `situation in Jersey', I suggest you read the blog itself. For the purpose of the current posting, the main issues of concern are:

the ongoing police investigation of historical child abuse at the former Haut de la Garenne children's home, and the pursuit of justice for the victims
the prevailing culture within the political administration of the island which appears, over a period of decades, to have allowed such abuse to flourish
the de facto one party state - labelled by some the Jersey Establishment Party (JEP) - that has obstructed the police and the pursuit of justice - the charitable interpretation being an antideluvial attitude towards preserving the international image of Jersey; or, less charitably, a sinister closing of ranks to protect cronies
the impossibility of obtaining justice within such a system, where the judiciary and the establishment politicians appear to be less than separate parts of the same oligarchy
the formal declaration by the police of a senior education official as a suspect under investigation for child abuse, and the failure of the authorities to suspend the individual pending the outcome of enquiries, pleading a duty of care towards employees that overrides all other perceived duties

Now that is just to set the scene. But this posting is not just about Jersey - it is also about the growing practice of blogging.

You might imagine that all of the above points would have found their way into the local media. Well, actually no. You see the establishment has effective control of the media too. Are you thinking Soviet Union now? - it may sound incredible, but that's not too far from the mark. The local BBC channel actively stifles political debate that might challenge the status quo, and the only local paper, the Jersey Evening Press ( = JEP, get the connection?) even publishes made-up letters in support of the oligarchy. This may sound just too far fetched - but read Stuart's blog.

It is no surprise then that Jersey has a flourishing blogging community (like China I imagine). Many islanders have ditched the conventional media outlets in disgust and have opted to get their news direct from Stuart. The sense of community through a common cause is palpable, and, with Stuart's blog having now attracted over 70,000 discrete readers, a tipping point may be close. Newspapers are running scared of the internet - and not just in Jersey. Advertising revenue, their life-blood, is vanishing as internet-savvy companies learn to exploit the online market. And when the point is reached where most citizens choose to source their news from blogs both the raison d'etre and the viability of the traditional media may disappear forever. And, in Jersey at least, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that this point is rapidly approaching.

I take absolutely no pleasure in this prediction. I am for the most part a staunch admirer of the quality of journalism to be found in the `serious' media in the UK. But "the times they are a'changing" and the traditional media will be forced either to adapt and find a way of living in harmony with the online dissemination of news - or perish. Efforts to manipulate or massage the news to suit a particular political agenda will be more easily and rapidly exposed as more people realise they can locate primary sources of news for themselves on the internet. Thus truth will out.

As ever with the internet, the freedom it brings is a double-edged sword. The technology itself is a morally neutral medium that can just as easily be used as a vehicle for obfuscation and disinformation as it can to reveal the truth. As citizens of the online news community we need well-tuned antennae. We need a `moral compass' that will allow us to recognise and home in on those sources charcterised by honesty, integrity, compassion and a commitment to truth, justice and clear ethical principles.

Where better to test your moral compass than by logging in to Stuart Syvret's blog. You will find all these qualities in spades. He really is setting a standard for committed and principled investigative blogging which should have the emasculated media in Jersey and beyond truly fearful for their future.

Do Directors of Education Abuse Children?

2008-10-03T18:51:00.000+01:00

Suppose for just a minute - and I know it is going to sound far-fetched - that a Director of Education and his predecessor had been publicly accused by a local politician of systematic physical abuse of children. And that the allegations were under investigation by the police. What would you expect to happen?

You might expect the employee concerned to be suspended - without prejudice - while the investigation was conducted. You might expect the media - local and national - to afford the matter some attention: it would after all be an extraordinary story.

You might expect all this - unless of course it happened in Jersey.

For such an allegation has this week been made in Jersey - so far to absolutely deafening media silence. And not the slightest hint of anyone being suspended.

I make no apology for referring once again to Jersey Senator Stuart Syvret's blog. You need only know that McKeon is the recently retired Director before I let Stuart take up the story:

In the early 1980s McKeon was the Head of the then child secure unit, known as Les Chennes; this place having gradually taken over child imprisonment responsibilities from the infamous Haute de la Garenne, which closed in 1986.

While McKeon was the Head of the “school” – as it was euphemistically known – his Deputy Head was Mario Lundy.

McKeon, miraculously, worked his way up the Education hierarchy to become its Chief Officer – a position from which he retired only last Christmas. And – wouldn’t you know it – his side-kick, Lundy, followed the same career arc – and replaced McKeon as the Chief Officer of Education at the beginning of this year.

Tom McKeon and Mario Lundy were both in the habit of routinely committing savage, violent assaults on the male children in their care.

And so ‘normalised’ were both men to this criminal conduct they thought nothing of blithely carrying out such assaults on an open basis – in front of other witnesses – children and adults.

And we are not talking about the occasional slap on the wrist or tweaked ear.

McKeon was known as “The Pinball Wizard” because such was his calculated propensity for violent child abuse – he even had the furniture in his office at Les Chennes arranged in such a way as to afford a nice, clear run-up to the walls of the room.

He was then able to grab children by the arm, take a run-up – and swing them –wrestling-fashion – so that the child would smash savagely against the walls.

Bouncing children off the walls and furniture in this way gave rise to the nick-name “The Pinball Wizard”.

Now that's just a flavour of the astonishing allegations. I urge you to visit the blog and read the whole posting and the comments it has attracted.

So where on earth is the mainstream media coverage? Stuart Syvret's blog has attracted 60,000 readers. This is more than the circulation of "The Scotsman". So don't tell me this has somehow escaped the radar of the media.

Maybe they just don't care - Jersey after all is an island with half the population of Dumfries and Galloway, which sits nearer to France than England and enjoys a quaint constitutional status that affords it the same nationhood as Scotland at the Commonwealth Games, along with its vaguely suspicious `offshore' tax status. And sadly it is far from unique in having experienced institutionalised child abuse.

Or maybe they are just too lazy: there is a lot of reading in Senator Syvret's blog. Or maybe too cowardly - fearing litigation perhaps if names are aired. Stuart Syvret has no such fear, and he has explained clearly why. His blog is written in forensic detail and with passion. But it is the regular comments his blog attracts from some of Jersey's abuse victims that ultimately give the greatest credence to what he is trying to do. Beyond question they deserve justice. The UK Government (i.e. Justice Minister Jack Straw) has shown a marked reluctance to intervene to ensure justice, despite their constitutional entitlement - I should say obligation- to do so.

If there are any real investigative journalists with a social conscience still out there, the story is waiting. To capture the current public preoccupation, their starting place could be Jersey's dependence on international banking at this time of crisis, and a few short steps would lead them to the serious failings in the governance of the island and the devastating effect this is having on the quest for justice for the victims of abuse.

Is Jersey in Africa?

2008-09-24T21:06:00.000+01:00

I just don't get it. This is about Jersey again, and I make no apologies. If a tsunami hit the island tomorrow it would rightly be all over the papers - yes even here in cold, distant Scotland - and we would probably all dig deep into our pockets to provide for the victims and play our tiny part in restoring normality.

Yet the victims of abuse at the former Haut de la Garenne children's home, the victims - it is becoming clear - of an institutionalised culture of harsh treatment that prevailed for many years - might well wish for a tsunami if it would sweep away the apparatus of the state that so cruelly conspires to deny them justice.

If you think I overstate the case, take the time to read Jersey Senator Stuart Syvret's blog on http://stuartsyvret.blogspot.com/. It will take some time, but I urge you to do it. In case you fear that you are just reading one side of the story, check out your gut feeling - are you reading the words of a person of integrity? Since January there have been nearly 120 postings and thousands of comments.......

OK, have you got the picture now? If you didn't know it before, you will now know that Birmingam Lib Dem MP John Hemming and Grimsby Labour MP Austin Mitchell have been urging the UK Government to intervene, which it is constitutionally entitled to do, to ensure that justice is done. Not much about that in the UK media was there? And maybe you did hear a little fragment of the BBC interview with former Deputy Chief Constable Lenny Harper, who led the Jersey abuse investigation until his retirement earlier this year. But now you also know that he said of the obstruction his enquiry encountered:

"There just seems to be a thread running though of people interfering, and people obstructing, together with a series of delayed decisions, which all very, very, easily lead amongst victims to an even stronger suspicion that they are not being supported, and that people are actively trying to delay the enquiry.

Now even if I look at it from a cold and clinical investigator's point of view, there were a vast number of decisions which just totally escaped me, in respect of a rationale for them. "

And now you will know that a former very senior official has recently been unmasked on the blog as having been involved in the physical abuse of children. And still the British media maintains its silence.

You would think Jersey was in Africa, where we somehow manage to ignore or tolerate flagrant abuses of human rights, either because it's not nice to interfere or because we think that's just the `African way'.

Jersey deserves our attention. The victims of abuse deserve our support. And they deserve it now.

What future for the SNP?

2008-09-06T20:17:00.000+01:00

Is it just me who is wondering what will happen to the SNP post-Scottish independence?

Or, more particularly, what will happen to Alex Salmond, Nicola Sturgeon et al? Alex clearly will become President, Father of the Nation, King or however we decide to honour the architect of our new status. Chris Hoy or Andy Murray will of course be appointed to the Hoose o' Lairds and appointed Sports Minister. But seriously though, what happens to the SNP?

There seem to me to be two options. Either they will all migrate to splinter nationalist parties, such as the FNP (Fife) or SNP (Shetland) or else they will be absorbed into the new political landscape. Whatever that may be. I can't see many of the left-leaning Nationalists wanting to jump into bed with the dejected rump of Scottish Labour (even with Alistair Darling as their emollient new leader), much less Annabel and the Scottish Tories. A few perhaps will be tempted to bolster Tommy Sheridan's ranks and perhaps a few more will turn Green or Lib Dem. Perhaps the majority will be content to retire to the family croft with the comfort of `job done'.

What is Scotland?

2008-09-06T19:48:00.000+01:00

With the Labour party in its death-throes, the Conservatives meaningless in Scotland, and with the consummate politician Alex Salmond at the helm, Scotland has now passed the tipping point on its journey to independence.

Which raises the question: just what exactly is Scotland? Earlier this year an unofficial referendum in Berwick-upon-Tweed resulted in a majority in favour of the oft-disputed burgh returning to Scotland. Well fine and dandy. As Descartes once said, "I think I am Scottish, therefore I am."

But why stop at Berwick?

Let's suppose, sometime after Scotland has won its independence, a groundswell of opinion emerges in, say, Cumbria, that folk would prefer to throw in their lot with Scotland. This is overwhelmingly approved in a referendum, so Cumbria joins the party. What next? Perhaps other coterminous English regions would consider their position. How much, after all, do Geordies identify with London? You might try asking Kevin Keegan.

Now I am not saying that Scotland should have designs on currently English territory - I am just following the logic of Descartes. And there would of course have to be a clear geographical rationale for any such arrangements. It would be patently absurd for the good people of the Isle of Wight to harbour ambitions to sport the kilt, although I would have to concede that the Scottish legal system might better address the need for justice in Jersey than then current ruling elite in London.

Why Bother About Jersey?

2008-09-05T19:48:00.001+01:00

OK, I guess you know about the Jersey child abuse case, centred around the former Haut de la Garenne children's home. Maybe you think it is just another sad chapter in the litany of child abuse cases that have come to light in recent years. A sad chapter it certainly is - most especially for the victims - but don't imagine this case is just like all the rest. For it seems that in Jersey things are done according to `the Jersey Way', and this all-pervasive culture amongst the ruling echelons of Jersey society has evoved to protect the status quo - potentially at odds with the hopes of the victims for justice.

The closing of ranks of the Catholic church in the face of the earliest abuse allegations against priests is not dissimilar. The first instinct of the church was misguided compassion for the `fallen priests', who, having yielded to the temptation of the flesh, required the full and forgiving support of the church, to the point of denial and even vilification of victims. Later experience has strongly suggested that child-abusing priests were following their vocation as paedophiles and cynically manipulated the church as a vehicle enabling their gratification. Such people never deserved the naive protection of the church.

Read Jersey maverick Senator Stuart Syvret's blog to learn how the Jersey oligarchy is also closing ranks to conceal the truth.

http://stuartsyvret.blogspot.com

Automated Answering - Time for Legislation?

2008-08-15T16:29:00.000+01:00

It's pretty much a cliche that we all hate being put on hold, told we are in a queue and then forced to listen to Bohemian Rhapsody for who knows how long. The wait may be long, or very long but the stress is inevitable, and comes from the utter powerlessness of your situation. By the way, I don't believe that Lisa, Trisha and Mandy are separate members of their customer care team - just the same person with a different random name that appears on their screen each time they answer a call.

Anyway, I have to admit that on a couple of occasions I have had experiences that break the mould. Sadly I don't recall the organisations, or I would give them full credit here. But how refreshing their approach was. This time the script went like this: "We are sorry that all our operators are busy at the moment. Your call has been placed in a queue. You are number. One hundred and thirty seven. And we expect your call to be taken in approximately. Four. Minutes." Yeah right, you hear me thinking. Four minutes indeed. Then the message again, only now I am 103 in the queue and the estimate is 3 minutes. Then 69 and 2 minutes. And yes I do get to speak to a real human being in roughly 4 minutes. What a brilliant system! I love these people!

But sadly this system has not caught on, despite the fact that it's the ideal way to make friends of all your customers. Or maybe because of this fact - at least in the case of those companies who just want to fleece the customer by keeping them on a premium line for as long as possible, rather than actually providing a service.

Now I think the situation calls for legislation. It should become law for all companies to operate an accurate, informative automated answering system like this. The government could even pay for it all with the savings from the National Health Service having to deal with far fewer stress-related illnesses!

Conservatives Need a New Name

2008-08-14T21:07:00.000+01:00

The perceived wisdom is that - sooner or later - Gordon Brown is on his way out and the Conservatives will win the next election. This may or may not be true. What certainly is true is that I will never vote for any party associated with the word `conservative'.

Conservative - what does it mean? The dictionary I consulted offered `favoring traditional views and values; tending to oppose change'. Now `traditional' has positive connotations for me when applied to, say, beer or cheese; but people who claim to espouse traditional values are often those whose idea of traditional is the transient social norms of the 50s. And those who `tend to oppose change' are close cousins to the those such as creationists who deny its existence. To`tend to oppose change' is irrational, cynical and often born of self-interest.

The head of an organisation to which I once applied for a job explained that his organisation was clearly successful by any of the accepted measures. He did not know why, but he was not about to change anything: `if it ain't broke, don't fix it*'. At that moment I lost interest in the job. He should have said, "I don't know why it works so well, but I am going to find out. Then I am going to figure out how to make it even better." But he didn't - he was a conservative.

If the Conservative Party seriously wants to attract new voters like me, it needs a new name, one that embraces change, optimism and generosity of spirit. Any suggestions?

* H L Mencken defined a platitude as `something that everyone believes to be true, but which is in fact false'. This phrase is a good illustration.