In an attempt to undo some damage possibly caused by discredited, and disgraced, ITV/CTV (Jersey's ITV franchise) we publish an e-mail below sent from VFC to the Jersey Child Abuse Inquiry.
It is inaccurate (and burying of) stories from the State Media that allowed the Jersey Child Abuse cover-up to continue and it looks like ITV/CTV wishes to carry on its time honoured tradition of, at best, sloppy "journalism" and at worst down-right lies in order to frighten victims/witnesses from coming forward to the Committee of Inquiry to give evidence.
The e-mail (below) was sent on Friday 6 August 2015.
"Dear Inquiry Team.
I'd like to bring to your attention yet more inaccurate reporting and sloppy "journalism" from the discredited and disgraced ITV/CTV.
On its 6 o'clock alleged "news" programme yesterday (Friday 7 August 2015) it reported on the testimony of Morag and Tony Jordan. Twice during the report it was stated that the Jordan's were "cross-examined" By Patrick Saad.
I (unaccredited) (and just about anybody with the slightest interest in your Inquiry) am aware that there is NO "cross-examination" of witnesses and to the credit of the Inquiry it has gone to great lengths to stress this fact. Indeed from the very outset of the Inquiry on April 3rd 2014 Judge Oldham QC, at her opening address, at which (I believe) ITV/CTV was present she stated;
"This is an inquiry: no individual or institution is on trial. This does not mean that the Inquiry will avoid making criticisms, but it does mean that there are no parties and no sides; no scoring of points. Every witness will have a valuable perspective. There will be no cross-examination of witnesses."
Judge Oldham went on to reiterate the point that there will be NO cross examination of witnesses in her opening address here;
"I turn now to legal representation. I repeat this is an Inquiry, not a trial. You do not need a lawyer to provide your evidence to the Inquiry. The Inquiry’s legal team will assist anyone asked to give evidence or produce documents. You will be taken through your evidence by Counsel to the Inquiry and will not be cross examined by anyone else. Most of those who give evidence to us will therefore not require legal representation. They will give evidence to the Inquiry and may have no further role to play."
I argue (as does the Inquiry) that witnesses believing they will be cross-examined while giving evidence could be deterred from coming forward. Sloppy inaccurate "journalism" like that of ITV/CTV could be extremely detrimental to the aims and objectives of the Inquiry in attempting to gather as much evidence from as many witnesses as possible.
This is not the first time ITV/CTV has mis-represented the proceedings of the Inquiry. It also misquoted a recent witness/transcript when it reported that a witness "accused" former Health Minister, and Whistleblower, Stuart Syvret of encouraging residents of homes to make "allegations" against staff at the homes. The witness/transcript actually said that Mr. Syvret encouraged residents to make "complaints." The connotation could be seen as residents being encouraged to tell lies. When the fact is that Mr. Syvret was doing the right thing as Health Minister by encouraging victims to voice their "complaints" of abuse and wasn't "accused" of doing anything.
It must be said that the Panel itself should take some responsibility for the sloppy "journalism" peddled by ITV/CTV who have a long history of this when it concerns the Child Abuse scandal and subsequent cover-up. If the Panel had done just the slightest of research into ITV/CTV's reporting (or not) of the Child Abuse scandal then I am confident it would not have granted it accreditation and banned it from the Inquiry's Media room instead of banning Bloggers. (Jersey's only independent media)
It is a waste of time me contacting ITV/CTV (copied in) directly because it has a complete disregard for the English Language as demonstrated HERE. Further has a complete disregard for the facts as demonstrated HERE and no matter how inaccurate its reporting is ITV/CTV always believes everything it broadcasts is "entirely accurate" as demonstrated in the above links and HERE.
Could I ask the Panel, in an attempt to undo any of the damage ITV/CTV might have caused the Inquiry by possibly deterring witnesses from coming forward to ask ITV/CTV to correct its latest misreporting by broadcasting an apology and correcting its misrepresentation of the facts? To make it clear that witnesses are NOT cross-examined?
Could I then please ask the Panel/Inquiry Team what sanctions are open to it should an "accredited" media outlet continue to misrepresent proceeding of the Hearings, and which, if any, of those sanctions will ITV/CTV incur?
Kind Regards.
VFC. (Unaccredited)"(END)
It is inconceivable to believe ITV/CTV was unaware that witnesses ARE NOT subject to cross examination. How is it, at all, possible to make that kind of "mistake?"
The Inquiry has been doing a good job of its expert questioning of witnesses without cross examining them. Information is coming to light from documents acquired by the Inquiry that shows it (Inquiry Team) is doing some serious homework/research in some areas.
Some good work is being done by the Inquiry (and some not so good) but when the "accredited" media continues to peddle inaccuracies/untruths it does the Inquiry no good and can prevent witnesses from coming forward.
We hope witnesses will still come forward to the Inquiry who can be contacted through its website HERE. It is not too late for Victims and Survivors to come forward.
Hopefully readers will be assured, by this Blog Posting, that witnesses ARE NOT cross examined and will have a flavour (by clicking on the links provided) of ITV/CTV's history of making up its own stories rather than reporting the facts.
As well as Victims and Survivors coming forward we'd like to reassure the likes of Bill Ogley, Ian Critch, Jon Richardson, Ian Le Marquand, Emma Martins, David Warcup, Mick Gradwell, Frank Walker and with the latest revelations coming from the Child Abuse Inquiry, and State Media PHILIP BAILHACHE. Not forgetting the notorious ANDREW LEWIS that you will not be cross examined and that your testimony is eagerly awaited.
We will keep readers posted as to what sanctions (if any) the serial offender ITV/CTV incur from the Inquiry for this latest, potentially dangerous, crock of (not even) Churnalism.
This is the kind of misinformation that stops people from coming forward at all, everyone is sure that they will be misrepresented in one way or another.
ReplyDeleteThe J.E.P did this to us when our daughter Natasha was beaten up at school by a group of boys the ring leader being the nephew of the woman suspected of causing vandalism over a fraud case, long story, short of it is the headmistress tried to hush up what happened, then Education did the same thing and the J.E.P reported it implying we had harmed our daughter which we did not, did you know that the states schools have no duty of care for the children, and how can you blame parents for something that happened in school to any child when they are not even present at the time?
The big problem is a complete lack of real Justice in the island, everything you say or do can easily be twisted by the powers that be and their main media outlets, so people do not want to come forward due to the culture of fear, who wants to be turned into a leper in the society in which they live? Because being shunned or rejected by others you see every day around is not nice and this is one thing most fear, it effects peoples job prospects in the island and in some cases their social life, I know I have been there.
Hear Hear Linda! Thank you.
ReplyDeleteThey should never have denied you evidence-based bloggers official access. No one else has the credibility to cover the proceedings. There are many other examples of state media failures and misleading coverage of the COI already. Shame on them.
ReplyDeleteElle
VFC.
ReplyDeleteWell done for waiting until the time was right. The tide is finally turning and as someone would say: "The train is now gathering speed and soon will be coming off the tracks".
VFC - you are absolutely right in the points you make in this posting.
ReplyDeleteThe spin-doctoring - the PR - the lies - being peddled by Channel Television, the ITV/ITN franchise in the Channel Islands - or Krichefski TV as it's also known - are brazen, yet very capable - as they're designed to be - of misleading the public.
In this case, quite deliberately misleading the public into thinking this "public inquiry", the CoI, is being "tough"; that it is a serious and challenging process, one which is really putting pressure on the culpable.
Alas - it isn't.
And that is what I feel might be missing from this posting. You rightly remind people of the facts - the fact that this "public inquiry" and its chair have made it crystal-clear they will not undertake cross-examination.
But there's a danger in that you convey the idea that that is a "good thing".
It is not a good thing.
It is a very bad thing.
The absence of cross-examination from the processes of this "public inquiry" is worse than bad - it is terminal to its standing as a process possessing legal legitimacy.
And I'm not un-sensitive to the fact many good witnesses - survivors, whistle-blowers and others - might find the idea of cross-examination to be intimidating. That's understandable. But what such witnesses don't perhaps understand is that the culpable - the guilty - fear cross-examination a 1000 times more than those with nothing to hide.
Speaking personally - I want to be cross-examined - I want to give evidence-in-chief - I want to be closely challenged - grilled - questioned - by lawyers - under oath. I want to be questioned on that basis - with the crooks questioned on the same basis - and for that to happen in a legal environment where those committing perjury - those who lie in judicial & quasi-judicial proceedings such as public-inquiries - get prosecuted and jailed for perjury.
Unfortunately, the Jersey "public-inquiry" is not providing that degree of rigour - of accountability.
I'm fighting for a process that does.
Stuart
If they were to cross examine alleged abusers then they would have to do the same to victims and that could be tough on people.
DeleteBut what makes you think that you would need to be cross examined?
Comment at 11:38 says: -
ReplyDelete“If they were to cross examine alleged abusers then they would have to do the same to victims and that could be tough on people.
But what makes you think that you would need to be cross examined?”
This is why Jersey’s in the catastrophic mess it is; a situation almost certainly terminal to the island’s present broken polity, and a situation that’s so bad the contagion of these events has spread to the British state and looks set to lead to constitutional re-adjustments. It was always the likely consequence of permitting the British quasi-jurisdiction of Jersey falling wholly into the hands of functional psychopaths – and their pet startlingly overt morons such as the commenter.
Statuary public inquiries take evidence from witnesses – then cross-examine them. That’s what public inquiries do. It’s an unavoidable necessity in obtaining, gaining access to, and testing evidence. It is the means of getting to the truth. Statutory inquisitorial bodies must be impartial, must be objective, must be unbiased. They therefore must apply their methods and powers fairly and to all-comers. Anyone who therefore says, “but that might be too tough on our side – on the good side – too tough on the survivors and whistleblowers – steel yourself for some harsh news: you have never supported there being a public inquiry. What you’ve been seeking – and what you’ve been mugged into supporting – is a fake – a sham – a process with zero real, legal legitimacy or credibility; a process that’s nothing more than a PR stunt for the Jersey and London Establishments to make them look as though they’ve had an inquiry – when in reality, they haven’t.
If you support a public inquiry – then you support a public inquiry. If what you support is a “public inquiry” – but only on condition it doesn’t ask us serious questions or enable all points of view to question and test the testimony – then what you support is not a public inquiry. What you’ve been conned into supporting is a kind of ‘damage-limitation’ exercise designed by spin-doctors.
I need to be cross-examined – because all witnesses need to be cross-examined. That’s what statutory quasi-judicial tribunals do.
I will not be a party to conferring “credibility” on this fake process – this process which has allowed, enabled and facilitated a succession of startlingly culpable criminals to lie – and to simply avoid so many of the obvious questions because they’ve not been subject to cross-examination.
I do not consent to this ultra-vires insult to the intelligence.
To consent is to surrender one’s rights.
The legal principle is Volenti non fit injuria - that to which a man consents cannot be considered an injury.
To consent to this nonsense is to surrender one’s rights – essentially, to say “oh well, I think it’s just fine if these criminals are permitted to escape cross-examination and are permitted to commit perjury with impunity – I think it’s OK for these criminals and the polity they’ve captured to abuse my rights, and for them to be enabled to continue to do so.”
No.
It is not acceptable.
I do not consent.
Stuart Syvret
It may not be acceptable to you but once this Public Inquiry is finished that is it.
DeleteVictims won't want to go through the whole process again so its a case of take it or leave it.
You keep on telling us this Island is run by psychopaths and criminals yet it didn't stop you seeking to re-join them 4 years ago when seeking election.
"You keep on telling us this Island is run by psychopaths and criminals yet it didn't stop you seeking to re-join them 4 years ago when seeking election."
DeleteThat makes a lot of sense: "a jurisdiction is run by psychopaths and criminals- so we shouldn't oppose them".
That's what I meant about the catastrophically moronic 'level' the polity of Jersey has sank to.
The Jersey "public inquiry" isn't acceptable to me - because it is isn't lawful. And if a state-act isn't lawful - then it isn't lawful. Game over.
The Jersey "public inquiry" is an abuse of my human rights. It isn't lawful. I'm not co-operating with state actions which are not lawful. End of.
That the Jersey "public inquiry" is a corrupt - is a fake - is there to be seen in so many ways. Not least the desperately terrified begging and pleading which criminals and alcoholic psychopaths keep on laying upon me - week after week - month-in and month-out - to engage with it - to confer "credibility" on it. These lunatics know just what the unavoidable - the inevitable - alternative is. The arrival the real rule-of-law. And all the consequences on them which are going to flow from that inevitability.
The laughably defective Jersey "public inquiry" - in reality the lawyers of UK Special Branch, Eversheds - who share their real bosses stark incompetence? "Take it or leave it?"
I'm leaving it.
Stuart Syvret
You have made it quite, quite clear Stuart that you are 'leaving it', so please, can you now stop posting about all that is 'wrong' with this Inquiry, and let the Inquiry and others get on with it and see it through to its conclusion.
DeleteA lot of people feel very let down by you, and yes, people who supported you through all the good and bad times. However, your negativity is not perhaps having the affect you would wish it to have. Some of us still have faith either with or without you. As has been stated previously this is 'the only gig in town', and if you choose not to be part of it so be it.
You have made your position quite clear, so presumably you will not be submitting any more negative comments?
I too get weary of reading these hate posts by Stuart which benefit nobody.
DeleteThis is 'the only gig in town' because there is no way another similar Inquiry would ever be funded.
No, I will not stop posting about all that is wrong with this purported "public inquiry".
DeleteThe Jersey "public inquiry" is merely the latest phase of the ultra vires corruption of the Jersey polity. It is so obviously - and so irrefutably - ultra vires - an entire LLP of lawyers can't answer the legal critique.
We all know now what Special Branch want to appear in the "conclusions" - so that's what's going to appear.
We all, equally, know what is not going to appear in the "conclusions" - which is the core fact which should appear - namely that Jersey is constitutionally an wholly corrupted - actually dangerous - feudatory; its been permitted to enable and cover-up the abuse and oppression of the vulnerable - and that the legal and constitutional culpability for that falls squarely upon the Monarch and Monarchy given the status of the Crown Dependencies being outside of - in fact expressly excluded from - the Act-of-Settlement. The Crown functions in Jersey are - by any modern standard - plainly just criminal enterprises.
Those are the legal facts.
Those are the facts which require to be addressed - by anyone who is serious about the real, long-term, public interest.
Let me explain something - something which I had thought long obvious, but which appears to still elude some people: it is simply not possible - in fact it is wholly impossible - to have fought these wars - if you give an utter damn what people think.
"People feel let down be me"? Dear oh dear.
Understand this: I do not give a damn - not a f*ck - what the commenter - or anyone else - thinks of me. Nor have I done for years. Nor will I ever do so.
I learnt a long time ago - you can either do what is right - or you can worry about what the public think of you.
It is not possible to do both.
Time to wake-up, eh? The power our oligarchy abuses over us is the power of opinion-management - of manipulating, controlling, massaging what the public think. And that power - that weapon - of "public opinion" is the threat they held for decades over the heads of those who would speak-out and do the right thing. The child-abusers and those who covered-up for them always had the opinion-management industry on their side.
At every single stage of my attempting to uncover and fight this from late 2006 onwards - the threat - and the reality - our corrupt, child-abuse concealing Establishment used to try and stop me - deter me - at every stage - was "negative publicity"; it was a cycle of ever-escalating use of the opinion-management industry to marginalise, attack, smear, damage and isolate me.
It didn't work to deter me then. It sure as hell isn't going to deter me now.
Sorry - that ammunition has been spent. It failed.
The war goes on.
Jersey is not the theatre of this war. "The only gig in town" - is where battle comes down.
The UK Supreme Court - now fatally contaminated with the Jersey child-abuse cover-up.
Stuart Syvret
Stuart, if I were you I would ignore the comment "A lot of people feel very let down by you..." at 20:07, and other comments by the same author.
DeleteIt has the hallmark of Jersey's biggest troll. A man who has spent almost a decade trotting out similar posts in Jersey cyberspace, all with the hallmark "lots of people" or "many people" or "the majority of people". It's childishly ridiculous and transparent.
Guess what trollboy? You don't speak for me. Get a life, get a job and above all, realise that you have lost.
Keep up the good work VFC and Stuart.
Stuart says "No, I will not stop posting about all that is wrong with this purported "public inquiry".
DeleteWell fine you do that, but it doesn't say a lot about your influence these days when we add up the people who have given evidence so far.
"People feel let down be me"? Dear oh dear.
Understand this: I do not give a damn - not a f*ck - what the commenter - or anyone else - thinks of me. Nor have I done for years. Nor will I ever do so."
Well thanks for everything, and with ending note, its a victory for the Establishment.
"its a victory for the Establishment"
DeleteReally???
People who take off their 'Jersey glasses' can see the train coming down the track
http://planetjersey.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=3971.msg60259#msg60259
"Jersey lawyers and civil servants refuse to hand over some critical evidence"
Even though the UK may take information from the Jersey child abuse inquiry, even though Jersey efforts will be watched by "outsiders " Jersey lawyers and civil servants still refuse to hand over documents to the enquiry in their misguided arrogance.
This plays into the hands of the critics of the COI saying it is just a side show, a paper tiger meant to go through the motions but without teeth or any real desire in it's terms of reference ( TOR's ) to hold the Jersey elite to account.
Where is the Chief Minister voice, supporting the enquiry by ordering his executive chief of civil servants John Richardson to order States departments officers to comply or face dismissal ?
Francis Oldham should be praised for bringing these issues into the public domain and spotlight.
The news of lack of cooperation will do nothing to add public confidence to the inquiry and is another valid reason why the Jersey mess should be absorbed into a proper legal and far more structured and forcefull UK enquiry.
It would be interesting to the see if Jersey's civil servants and lawyers would tell the UK authorities to get lost we are not playing.
Jersey is seen by many on literally dozens of internet blogs as the paedophile island, these misguided ( or worried ) high ranking lawyers and civil servant's are adding to that reputation which is unfair to the majority of good people that live on Jersey.
It may be given the lack of full cooperation by Jersey, Francis Oldham QC saves her reputation and the dignity of her panel and corrects the appalling situation. This would by achieved by personally writing to the Hon. Lowell Goddard DNZM with a request to include Jersey in her review in an effort to discover the whole truth.
Bailiwick Express
Reports, emails and investigations are some of the key documents that are being held back from the abuse inquiry, according to the senior lawyer leading it.
Frances Oldham QC has made the explosive allegation at the end of the current phase of hearings, saying that States departments and government lawyers are refusing to hand over some critical evidence, and handing some files over too late to ask questions of key witnesses.
http://www.bailiwickexpress.com/jsy/news/civil-servants-and-lawyers-are-holding-back-key-evidence-head-abuse-inquiry/?t=i
[with thanks to] 'Boatyboy'
Over the coming months and years there is going to be a backlash across the British Isles against "power paedophilia". Jersey's independence can only survive this cleansing if it demonstrates itself fit.
One can support this CoI (such as it is) and also recognise that Stuart is doing the right thing (as usual)
THINK ('strength in depth')
Is Trevor and Shona Pitman giving evidence does anyone know?
ReplyDeleteInteresting comments on radio this morning criticizing the crown & states departments not giving documents to the inquiry.
ReplyDeleteInstead of fining st saviour for no centenier the crown should sort out their own house first
Talking to ex copper interesting story re the famous "not in the public interest" by AGs in past.Daphne Mulhanne was bang to rights on a theft charge but was deemed "not in public interest" to prosecute, yet another like Le Main & his planning application never prosecuted where does it all end. No wonder PB was against extra funds for the enquiry all getting too close to home!!!!
ReplyDeleteJersey is constitutionally an wholly corrupted says Stuart Syvret.
ReplyDeleteHe is right - as confirmed by Francis Oldham QC in breaking news.
Ms Oldham said that the inquiry is now considering setting a final deadline for the disclosure of the evidence – and that if the files are not handed over, they may have to assume that some people in government didn’t want to evidence to see the light of day.
http://www.bailiwickexpress.com/jsy/news/civil-servants-and-lawyers-are-holding-back-key-evidence-head-abuse-inquiry/?t=i
Have you had a response to your e-mail to the Inquiry?
ReplyDeleteYes (of sorts) and will publish soon.
DeleteThe inquiry is due to restart the week beginning Monday 8 September for four days, before it will take another break to prepare for the investigation into Operation Rectangle which is expected to begin in early October.
ReplyDeleteIf various States Departments & the Law office are withholding vital documents at this early stage of the inquiry. It will be very interesting to see how they will deal with the very suspicious unexplained suspension of Chief of Police Graham Power during Operation Rectangle!?
Indeed and hopefully the COI will have more luck in getting answers than I have from the disgraced ANDREW LEWIS.
DeleteThe suspension of Police Chief Graham Power is neither "suspicious" or "unexplained".
DeleteTo use the word "suspicious" is to imply there might have been a crime - but we haven't yet identified if so for certain, nor pinned down the necessary elements such as the mens rea and actus reus.
Precisely because the base, core elements are not "unexplained" - exactly because we do have the evidenced elements such as perpetrators, mens rea and actus reus already explained to a more than sufficient degree - the illegal suspension of Police Chief Graham Power is no mere "suspicion". If the Crown Officers, civil servants and lawyers who are holding back evidence are motivated to do so in an effort to deny that which is already an obvious, demonstrated criminal enterprise, they're engaged in futility.
But of course, the fact that these people - with the unlawful, suppressive, abusive support of their protectors in London - are already shown to have engaged in the gangster-hi-jacking of an entire policing function - doesn't mean that further evidence isn't there to be discovered.
Fortunately, some of us have declined to accept the poor bargain of trading in our right to the effective protections of the rule of law in exchange for the toothless PR measure that is a "public inquiry" - and instead are going to bring the good, old-fashioned, criminal-justice system to bear upon these matters.
Admittedly, that's going to take a little time yet, but when it happens - when - the civil servants, lawyers and Crown Officers presently still drunk with hubris and living in a dream-world are going to look back at these times and see that merely having their credibility & careers destroyed by a "public inquiry" was, as an option, a get-out-of-jail-free-card - compared to that which awaited them down the tracks.
You know, I'm not sure, even now, any of these clowns realise they've destroyed the Jersey polity - destroyed "The Jersey Way".
The hubris of these people is no small curious study.
Stuart Syvret
Wouldn't it just be hilarious if Graham Power's missing contract of employment turned up among papers being withheld/delayed.
ReplyDeleteOops.
An extremely good point Polo.
DeleteThe theft of Graham Power's contract of employment was just one of the crimes perpetrated to facilitate "the gangster-hi-jacking of an entire policing function".
DeleteGraham Power's copy was stolen from his work safe (together with other items) and the HR copy also was disappeared, along with all electronic copies!!!
I wonder how many other 'inconvenient' documents and bits of evidence have also been 'disappeared'.
Well how's about that then guys and girls?
The contract was stolen after his office safe was opened without his lawyer being present, and then the copy conveniently lost by human resources and every other trace of it gone. It had a clause stating that in any legal proceedings or matters involving the Chief of Police Graham Power, would receive the protection of lawyers funded by the States.
ReplyDeleteHe was left having to pay to defend himself after suspension etc, as he no longer had the contract with these specific terms mentioned. Of course Frank Walker and Bill Ogley could have easily stepped up and done the right thing confirming this was the case, but never did as they were central players in the whole conspiracy.
The Chief Executive of the Jersey States, at the time of Operation Rectangle will not have to give evidence at the COI because he now does not live in Jersey. He also will not give evidence because he was paid £500,000 to keep his mouth shut. Therefore Bill Ogley is in a win, win, situation....
ReplyDeleteWhere tf is the justice in that!?
I would like to clarify a couple of comments above. Cross examination is when a lawyer representing the other side questions the witness’s evidence. As mentioned in the blog above this is an inquiry, not a trial, the Inquiry’s legal team will take witnesses through their evidence. What is evident is that Patrick Sadd in particular is seeking clarification of some of the evidence given and as a result it could be said that some witnesses have found the going tough.
ReplyDeleteThe second point is about people like Bill Ogley etc not giving evidence because they now live outside the Island. That is not the case and a number of witnesses have already flown over or given evidence via video link.
Bob,
ReplyDeleteThere is no doubting that Bill Ogley was paid 500,000 quid hush money to go away and shut up. And he and his pay masters will be doing their best to not ever have him come back to Jersey, or to let him give evidence via video link. After all if he prefers not to give evidence to this inquiry who is going to make him and what has he to loose?
Bob, it is not only in criminal trials that cross-examination takes place. It is also takes place in civil trials - and in public inquiries. As you say, "lawyers from the other side question the witnesses' evidence". That process - of legal representatives of involved parties questioning testimony of witnesses - was long recognised as so fundamental to the effective and fair functioning of public inquires, it is a core part of the Salmon Principles.
DeleteThe position of the Jersey "public inquiry" - the CoI - in having repudiated the right of parties to have witnesses cross-examined - is wholly extraordinary. It is also a fundamental abuse of human rights.
It's fascinating - is it not - that a key witness like me would not only have no problem in being cross-examined - in fact I would positively welcome it. By way of contrast - Eversheds / Special Branch have chosen to side with, and to protect the crooks - by adopting ex-cathedra "protocols" - the manufacture of which themselves was not compatible with the legislative decision setting up the "inquiry" in that it ignored paragraph (e) - by blocking cross-examination in defiance of the Salmon Principles and Article 6 of the ECHR.
I have been - wholly unlawfully - denied my right to have the culpable parties / witnesses, cross-examined.
This is an abusive, corrupt act by Special Branch / Eversheds.
I've read many of the CoI's transcripts - and on a number of occasions watched Eversheds lawyers conducting questioning. Frankly - I wouldn't employ these people to issue parking tickets.
Stuart Syvret
Off tangent I know but:-
ReplyDeletehttp://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2015/08/17/jersey-its-beautiful-but/
"Best thing about living in Jersey is its not Guernsey. I say that slightly tongue in cheek but every proud Jersey man secretly harbors these thoughts. I think we should cut the rope and push it out into the channel a little further. To be fair though St Peter Port is a much nicer town than St Helier.
Worst thing about living in Jersey has to be the sucking up to the great and the good (in their eye only) that us mere mortals have to endure at every occasion whether we like it or not. Wouldn't mind a little if some of them had earned it, but most are there because of who they know and who they bow and scrape to. What Jersey desperately needs is some modern day hero's with honesty and integrity, fighting for justice and equality, and not afraid to challenge the status quo."
I could have gone much further and wanted too of course, but that would have been futile and stood no chance of publication.
Anyway nominations for modern day jersey hero's are.................. well you know who should be on that list you don't need me to tell you.
JRCbean
VFC, isn't there a very obvious problem here with the statement of Frances Oldham and the position taken by your public inquiry and their lawyers? They are a statutory public inquiry with all the attendant powers. If people, organisations or public departments are being obstructively slow in disclosing evidence, or even refusing to disclose evidence at all, why isn't the public inquiry simply using its statutory powers to subpoena, or subpoena duces tecum, and acquiring the evidence that way?
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry, but I find it quite remarkable that your public inquiry is pleading in this way, or that there are suggestions that it will "conclude its report but may draw unfavourable inferences if the evidence is withheld". They cannot be serious, surely? That approach has "spin-doctor" written all over it. No credible public inquiry, nor any credible report, could come to meaningful conclusions on that basis. For the Jersey public inquiry to go along with this is for them to collude with the Jersey Establishment's PR strategy, in which they figure a bit of bad publicity, a few slaps on the wrist, from the inquiry is the price worth paying, the lesser of two evils, compared to the truth being exposed.
I just doesn't wash.
I'm afraid as the weeks and months unfold the more and more obvious it becomes the Jersey public inquiry is being run by spin-doctors.
There are only two paths open to the Jersey public inquiry in this situation: they either stop messing around, and instead use the statutory powers they possess and go to court and get orders to seize all the evidence without further delay. Or, they resign, again without delay, on the basis their task has become impossible because of the obstructions of the Jersey Establishment.
The one path not credible or lawful is for the public inquiry to follow its present stance of just shrugging its shoulders and saying, 'oh well, we'll carry on and churn-out a defective report, a report fatally handicapped by the absence of significant amounts of unlawfully withheld key evidence, but don't worry, we'll make sure to say in the report what naughty boys and girls those Crown Officers, lawyers and civil servants have been.'
This is actually becoming absurd. Perhaps it's anarchy all-round, what with the obvious chaos and probable collapse of the UK public inquiry with their lead spin-doctor resigning tonight? It's becoming increasingly clear there's no leadership, no real leadership, in any of the British authorities. There's no sign yet of any of the British authorities having the willingness or ability to grasp the nettle of decades of state criminality involved in child-abuse cover-ups.
I think there could be an inherent weakness in your argument.
DeleteNot being a legal expert, the way I see it (and included in your argument) in order to subpoena any documents the Inquiry will have to do this through a Jersey court?
That being the case due to the politicised corruption of our courts and it is the Law Office itself who is allegedly withholding documents then it would be a fruitless, time and money, wasting exercise in attempting to get the Law Office to subpoena itself.
I admit I’m not familiar with the Jersey Public Inquiries Law but I had assumed, perhaps wrongly, that the power to subpoena inhered in the public inquiry body, and that your public inquiry had formally exercised those powers on the relevant parties, but those parties, your Crown Officers for example, were defying the statutory power of the Inquiry body? If my assumptions are correct, the obvious next step is the inquiry body making an application to court for its powers to be enforced.
DeleteI accept I make three assumptions in my reasoning: a) that your public inquiry does possess the power of subpoena, b) it has, in fact, sought to exercises its statutory powers to obtain evidence, and c) that power is being unlawfully defied by the Crown Officers, civil servants and their lawyers. Of course, if I’m wrong in those assumptions, that would, in some ways, put a different complexion on matters. But in other ways, not so much.
In respect of a), if the public inquiry does not actually possess powers similar to a UK public inquiry, then that would simply re-enforce the point that the body must go to court to utilise the court’s power to enforce subpoena for the inquiry, in accordance with the inquiry’s legislative purpose.
In respect of b) if the public inquiry does possess its own powers sufficient to subpoena and enforce subpoena, but it has not yet utilised those powers, then what we observe is a very remarkable state of affairs: a public inquiry with the statutory power to demand and obtain evidence and testimony from recalcitrant parties, but failing and refusing to exercise that power in the face of straight defiance.
In the case of c), the defiance by the actual Crown law and justice apparatus in Jersey shown to the Jersey public inquiry amounts to a contemptuous defiance of The Law, by your island’s Law administration. That’s at least as powerful a case for UK state intervention in Jersey on the grounds of a collapse in the proper rule of law as I’ve yet seen.
You make a fascinating point when you say, ‘That being the case due to the politicised corruption of our courts, and it is the Law Office itself which is withholding documents, then it would be a fruitless time and money wasting exercise trying to get the Law Office to subpoena itself.’
Doesn’t that structural ‘arrangement’ of the administration of ‘justice’ in Jersey not get to the very heart of the matter? That the Jersey ‘judicial’ function is, as you point out, a directly conflicted party in these matters, and that it stands as an insurmountable obstacle in the path of your public inquiry fulfilling its legislative purpose effectively? And if the ‘courts’ in Jersey do so obstruct the inquiry body, then it must resign. It would be in no way credible for the inquiry body to continue on its path with the passive acceptance that it could not enforce the necessary powers of investigation because Jersey’s ‘judicial’ system is politically corrupted.
Of course, it’s possible that, in spite of all the bluster of the public inquiry and its chair Frances Oldham, they have, so far, only merely ‘asked’ for evidence to be handed over, and it is that mere ‘request’ which is being defied by parties such as the Crown Officers and the civil servants. If that is the case, and, in truth the inquiry body has not mobilised and used a power of subpoena, then we’d be forced to conclude the Jersey public inquiry was corrupt and collusive with the conflicted Jersey authorities. If the Jersey public inquiry has the power to obtain evidence, but is refusing to utilise that power, thus allowing culpable conflicted parties to get away with not disclosing evidence because all they’re defying is a mere ‘request’, then what else are we observing if not corruption? The culture of concealment being engaged in and supported by the vey public inquiry which supposed to be investigating the culture of concealment?
As reported to Newsweek. It would seem the Jersey Public Inquiry is following the exact same pattern as the UK Public Inquiry:
ReplyDelete"Newsweek also confirmed that an additional 40 of the inquiry's staffers previously held positions in the British government, after cross-referencing with multiple databases, including the office of Britain's attorney general, which has been accused of not prosecuting prominent accused abusers. The inquiry declined to provide Newsweek with a full list of which departments had seconded staff and how many staff came from each department. Some of the departments, it said, included the Department of Health, the Department for Work and Pensions and the National Archives".
Link to NEWSWEEK ARTICLE.
DeleteWhat about Syvret then? He's refused to give evidence to the COI. You happy for them to get tough with him too? Why shouldn't they? People on this blog only see one side of things.
ReplyDeleteWell they way I see things they must be firm with Stuart Syvret as well. Isn't that basic to how these kind of things are supposed to wok? Like a level playing field for everyone. But they're not going to force him I bet you. If they did that he'll obviously argue about it in court and make the argument he's always made that the Jersey courts are not fair and are corrupt. He's right about that so the establishment want to keep any argument about the COI a mile from getting into court. So because they don't want get into a mess with Stuart legally arguing abut the COI they can't take anyone else to court. If they did everyone would say they were being biased against the establishment if they didn't do the same to him. So they're stuck aren't they they've either got to take everyone who doesn't cooperate to court or they have to take no one to court. And if they take no one to court then anyone who feels like it can just tell them to p*ss off and give them the finger.
DeleteYou must be either incredibly stupid or incredibly obtuse to think that Stuart Syvret's refusal to engage with the COI is in any way comparable with the refusal of of government departments and crown officers to provide documents requested by the inquiry.
DeleteBut to answer your question, yes, I would be happy for the COI to get tough with Stuart Syvret. I'm certain Stuart would be too; in fact I doubt many things would make him happier than the prospect of the COI taking legal action in an attempt to force him to engage.
And yes, most people on this blog do only see one side of things. The side where child abuse is exposed and the perpetrators and their protectors are brought to justice. But you are free to see the issue from the other side, where covering-up child abuse and protecting paedophiles to protect the establishment is a valid course of action. Perhaps you have a vested interest in this view?
Lets face it. Syvret's reasons for not giving evidence. Are completely opposite to Warcup, Gradwell, Ogley and Co's reasons for not giving evidence.
ReplyDeleteThose are a few thought-provoking comments, especially anonymous at 20:45 who hits the nail on the head with the problem the COI and their paymasters face. They've either got to enforce the provision of evidence, and do so with a fair hand to all the relevant witnesses, or not enforce the provision of evidence. If they do the latter then it's 'game over' for the panel and its work as far as ever obtaining any credibility is concerned. It will have shown itself to be a toy-town public inquiry in a toy-town jurisdiction. All just make-believe.
ReplyDeleteBut if they do try and enforce evidence and testimony provision from witnesses, how's that going to look when all of the Establishment side will have multi-million pound public-funded armies of law firms and lawyers representing them in their refusal to co-operate with the COI, but Stuart Syvret will have nothing. No resources at all, and he will have to be representing himself?
It's not an edifying, or credible, prospect. Not for the Jersey and London Establishment nor more significantly for the COI itself. The millions they are spending on spin-doctors couldn't sell that scenario.
Given the principled stances and sacrifices he's already made there can be no doubt at all that Syvret's thought through that prospect and is ready and willing to contend with it and pay whatever price falls on his shoulders. Whatever people may think of him, he's no fool. He will have seen the impossible corner the COI have painted themselves into in choosing to be the Goliath to his David. They've made a rod for their own backs. The more you think about it, the more crazy it was for the COI to refuse to give Syvret legal funding without tying him up in strings. One of the most corrupt and incredible features of this whole scandal is how Syvret has had to fight the army of the state and its judicial corruption for years without any legal representation. So if there's one thing any credible public inquiry had to do from the start was differentiate itself from those human rights abuses, and see that he got legal funding. Instead the COI fell on its face on day one by adopting and endorsing one of the most corrupt behaviours of the very public authorities they're supposed to be investigating. The more I think about it, the more jaw-dropping it seems.
If the final objective is to establish the proper rule of law in Jersey then the COI should be given all of the evidence that is available in order for it to be able to conclude that the government of Jersey and all its agencies not only have failed for decades to prevent the criminal abuse of children in its care but also has sought to cover up these crimes. What better way of showing that the proper rule of law in Jersey has indeed broken down. Please support the COI despite its imperfections. The final report from the COI will be a mighty weapon in the fight for fairness and justice. Do not abandon it. Give it the evidence that it needs to draw the right conclusions.
ReplyDelete@6:26
DeleteThe CoI has already had a massive impact despite it's many faults. While accepting and welcoming this it is critically important to also maintain an overview and not be taken for fools.
In it's enthusiasm to be as accommodating as possible to it's paymasters the CoI has stumbled and tripped at every turn from the failure to answer Daniel Wimberley's fundamental concerns over the CoI's "Protocols", See July 2014:
http://voiceforchildren.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/jersey-child-abuse-committee-of-inquiry.html
Daniel's press release got 131 comments on that blog. Tellingly the last being "Did Daniel get any media coverage of this? I didn't see any"
Even before the CoI revealed it's dodgy hand of 'fixed' and marked cards we were pre-warned of these behaviours in March 2014:
http://freespeechoffshore.nl/stuartsyvretblog/the-publics-inquiry-into-the-public-inquiry-starts-here/
Truth, justice, the island, the taxpayer could have been far better served if these blog contents had been taken on board by our esteemed leaders at the time.
We have a CoI that is (as warned) designed to hide or 'put to bed' as much as it will reveal. An expensive establishment PR and damage limitation exercise.
However we are where we are; part way through a half baked CoI with a one-sided lawyer-fest price tag.
This fundamentally flawed CoI has been foisted on survivors and on the Jersey taxpayer alike and at this stage there is no chance that the CoI is going to resign or put itself on a credible and legal basis.
The practical thing to do is to accept and welcome what the CoI can produce. Recognition and closure for some. Reporting in the MSM of some of the evidence that was on the child protection blogs the best part of a decade ago,
We would be very surprised if this CoI produces "a mighty weapon in the fight for fairness and justice" as commenter 6:26 states. It would after all be naive to imagine TPTB would design the CoI to produce that ....or to even allow that possibility. This I believe would be an explanation of this CoI's string of bizarre and apparently biased decisions.
We should accept and welcome what the CoI has and can produce. Some of the long extant evidence is now put in the 'mainstream' but we will be surprised if the "final report" and (importantly) media reporting is more than the PR mash: "there were HISTORIC mistakes and abuses .....but lessons have been learnt".
This is a very expensive and lawyer-glib way of leaving today's and tomorrow's children pray to exactly the same forces that abused past generations. today's and tomorrow's abuses will soon be "historic".
Any CoI with a genuine hunger to find the truth and protect children would have already engaged with critical witnesses like the Ex. Health Minister, or would have already have subpoenaed them rather than pretended they did not exist.
It is painful to accept yet further delay, but the CoI's failure to grasp either nettle actually presents campaigners with a WIN-WIN situation. The CoI will unavoidably produce some benefits, and largely 2nd hand 'revelations' but instead of providing closure for the establishment it leaves people like Mr.Syvret with much of his powder dry to fight the next battle in the UK.
The tide is turning in the UK against the power-paedophilia cover up. The CoI chair knows this and I suspect she has smelt the coffee and hopes that a little belated "tough talk" will give her career a future.
That remains to be seen. Watch this space.
6.26 Fair comment but you have missed one undeniable recent statement from the COI themselves regarding proper rule of law.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that the Jersey administration and judiciary have either delayed or not provided requested reports, emails documents etc etc.
Should an individual behave in this way the law would be brought down on them like a ton of bricks.
This is the judiciary that are working against the COI, certainly not for it.
How will they bring states departments to book refusing to supply required information, if the judiciary are using the same tactics ? Is that not enough proof that Jersey has established mafia tendencies ? How is that within the law ?
Call me naive but I just do not believe that the COI, so long as it has been provided with all the relevant evidence, will provide a report that is nothing but "PR mush"
ReplyDeleteOn the contrary I believe that the final report will be damning of our government and all of the agencies involved. Nothing else is possible.
Hi,
DeleteIt was a "PR mash" actually.
"Mush" is equally descriptive but "mash" imo has a more cherry picked cant.
I do hope that you are right, and one would have thought that any report will have to include at least a little 'damnation' to have any shred of credibility.
However, you would be surprised what can be achieved in the lucrative game of public inquiries.
Do you remember the inquiry into the "sexed up dossier" RE. WMD and the disastrous Iraq War? To everybody's surprise and contrary to the vast majority of the evidence that inquiry dammed the BBC and let the Blair government off nearly scot-free
ToR's, 'protocols' .....and being the paymaster traditionally let's you rent a verdict
We now have the imminent Chilcot Iraq War Inquiry making people nervous (and about to have it's plug pulled?)
Hilsborough went to it's 3rd Inquiry !
Bloody Sunday?
The CoI staff are looking to preserve their reputations in a changing world, so the result of this CoI will be very interesting.
The CoI right first time? .....well there's a first time for everything LOL
....but Jersey is a side show for Eversheds and they surely have bigger people and organisations to protect in the big picture.
The Jersey political gangsters have dirt of the London and Westminster political gangsters and they have no doubt been frantically pulling every string they have.
Unfortunately that is how it works and why children and the vulnerable are the last to be protected in the world of power-politics and power-paedophilia.
From my entire 11:23 comment you hit on the word "naive"
If you read my comment, I purposefully did NOT call you naive (it is there only by implication)
I will be absolutely delighted if you are proven not to be naive and if I and others are proven overly cynical.
Call me cynical? I'll survive that.
All the best.
Interesting that the commenter says the following:
Delete'However, you would be surprised what can be achieved in the lucrative game of public inquiries.
Do you remember the inquiry into the "sexed up dossier" RE. WMD and the disastrous Iraq War? To everybody's surprise and contrary to the vast majority of the evidence that inquiry dammed the BBC and let the Blair government off nearly scot-free
ToR's, 'protocols' .....and being the paymaster traditionally let's you rent a verdict.'
Who knows what the inquiry into the "sexed-up dossier re Iraq WMD" - and the Jersey child-abuse cover-ups - have in common?
I'll tell you shall, I?
Jonathan Sumption.
Formally Commissioner Sumption when helping the Jersey so-called "judiciary" cover-up child-abuse and oppress Stuart Syvret.
Formally Jonathan Sumption QC when representing Blair's government in the WMD sexed-up dossier public inquiry.
Now Lord Sumption, appointed by Jack Straw to the UK Supreme Court.
Well, a chap's got to have his rewards, eh?
Pip, pip!
In answer to 6:26 my already over-long comment on inadequate and "damage-limitation" Public Inquiries' I included the paragraph:
ReplyDelete"This is a very expensive and lawyer-glib way of leaving today's and tomorrow's children pray to exactly the same forces that abused past generations. Today's and tomorrow's abuses will soon be *historic* ".
The subject of "HISTORIC child abuse" is a discussion in itself. Not to mention a good subject for a PHD in psychology ....for better and younger people than ourselves!
As has been mentioned elsewhere, why is child sexual abuse from more than a year or two ago labelled "historic" by people such as the BBC and other media lovies?
Why so we uncomplainingly allow this insidious 'spin' into our everyday language?????
Q. When did we last hear mention of other "historic" crimes?
"Historic" burglary?
"Historic" murder?
"Historic" fraud?
.............?
A. NEVER !
British culture may provide the beginnings of an explanation. We hear occasional mention of "historic" rapes. Polite society avoids discussion of sex. the more pervy the sex the more British culture is likely to avoid open discussion. We joke and we flirt, but at a diner party or social gathering the discussion of child sexuality of child sex abuse transgresses more boundaries than say, anal sex or non-paedo paraphilia or activity.
This British culture of non discussion increases the risk to children. It helps the problem to hide in plain sight.
However, I believe that the main explanation of this shocking inconsistency (Re. "HISTORIC" child abuse) is rooted in human psychology.
Healthy humans require a semblance of security. An acceptance and perception that they and the people they care about are safe.
Okay, we can accept a degree of uncertainty and risk for ourselves but when it comes to children (particularly our own) this acceptance of uncertainty and risk becomes increasingly problematic for most people.
If we are to function, to go out to work, to live a normal life ....we have to believe that our children are safe.
That child abuse is conveniently labelled "historic" mitigates this basic and biological need.
Year on year, decade on decade we perceive that there was a problem ......BUT it's alright now, so we can sleep soundly and face the other pressing demands of the day.
Whilst it is important not to be paranoid or to tar the innocent, Paedophilia and sexual opportunism exist and is here to stay.
Paedophiles (by definition) gravitate towards children. To infiltrate schools, clubs, cubs/scouts and (tragically) orphanages, where the children most unprotected and mostly starved of attention & affection.....
Is it this biological need for security which would encourage us to accept half-baked findings of a half-baked CoI?
Or even to 'suffer' living in jurisdictions without the proper and fair rule of law!! ?
Humans do not like to "think the unthinkable". It is bad for their health (& wealth?) and their state of mind.
Another subject which must be grappled with is ........the humane and effective treatment and management of paedophiles.
Whatever the source of their sexuality "nature or nurture", some will inevitably fail to control their urges and will make any investment or take any risk to get the sexual and emotional experience they crave.
If sexually active paedophiles will compile dozens or even hundreds of victims. Identification and management of offenders has got to be part of any child protection policy if it is going to be effective.
That is the nature of the beast.
Non discussion, and acceptance that child abuse is "historic" only makes it easier for them to spread their disease and damage.
We have covered the topic of "Historic" Abuse previously on this Blog. Perfectly explained (rather like your own excellent comment) by Abusee, avid campaigner, and huge inspiration to many, including myself Tom Perry.
DeletePlease see the posting HERE.
The truth is that no COI was ever needed. All that was needed in Jersey was an honest, non-politicised police force brave enough to treat nobody as being above the law and strong enough to resist unlawful interference in its investigations; an honest, impartial and non-conflicted prosecution function; and an honest, impartial and non-conflicted judiciary. The COI is a fig leaf - a distraction designed to draw attention away from the obvious fact that we have none of the above, and ensure that none of the island's well-heeled, well-connected criminal classes are ever held to account.
ReplyDeleteAnon @ 21:43. Totally agree with your comment. That is why the best way forward for SS is to keep his powder dry!
ReplyDeleteIt’s no surprise the Jersey establishment have carried on winning. Here were are facing another of these periodical bouts of goading and criticising Syvret for choosing not to engage with the Jersey public inquiry. There’s a similar thread on Rico Sorda’s blog. As a long term supporter of your cause I’m going to be blunt. Syvret is right. Those of you who want him to work with the Jersey public inquiry are wrong. Just plain wrong. You need to ask yourselves what on Earth you imagine you’re doing? The situation you face in Jersey is a sustained breakdown in the rule of law at the highest levels. You yourselves have documented the criminal high-jacking of your Police Service and multiple examples of undisguised judicial corruption.
ReplyDeleteThere is only one remedy to that state of affairs, and that is for the UK government to meet its responsibilities and intervene to restore good governance in the island. The public inquiry is an excuse for that NOT to happen.
To be really blunt, the mistake your side made was to ever think that a public inquiry was the appropriate way forward at all. That is where you went wrong. Far from your side campaigning FOR a public inquiry, you should have actually been campaigning for there NOT to be a public inquiry, because a public inquiry was only ever going to be a fig leaf behind which the extraordinary extremity, the jurisdiction level collapse in the rule of law and rampant government corruption in your island, could hide.
Your community has suffered the full capture of its polity by a barely disguised criminal syndicate and a total assault on free democracy (the illegal oppression of Syvret) and the capture by criminals of the actual Police Service (the illegal suspension of Graham Power). Those are the facts. That’s what’s happened.
What the hell do you need a public inquiry for? Just to feed some gratuitous wallowing in the occasional embarrassing scraps they were going to have to have to throw you from their table? A public inquiry is actually WORSE than useless to you. What you need and what you’ve always needed is for survivors’ lawyers to take the UK government to court in England. I’ll say it again: Syvret is right. The rest of you are wrong.
@19:21
DeleteOne has grown accustomed to Mr.Syvret being proved right a decade or so after he is soundly vilified and rubbished on the island.
The CoI potentially stamps a whole bunch of "get out of jail free" cards for abusers if the necessary evidence cannot be proven to predate or exist outside of the CoI.
What the CoI has done is demonstrate that the establishment has been lying and misleading us. ....And to anyone who is paying attention, it proves that Syvret was right again!
Logically this should make a difference but a good proportion of even the educated islanders are just like the rock that the island is built on.
The CoI has represented exceedingly poor value for money but it has led to benefits including those listed above.
Given the apparently biased and incompetent conduct of the CoI we also find it difficult to believe that any thinking person would not see the necessity and benefit of whistleblower Syvret keeping his powder dry.
That Jersey granite that characterises a depressing portion of it's people?
Quite Dense!
....and degrades giving off noxious gas.
Constitutionally the onus is on the UK to sort this out. bit it seems bizarre to look to the UK for salvation when their institutions have equally been infiltrated and hijacked by paedophiles and cover up merchants?
So you think Syvret was wrong to call for a public inquiry?
Delete2:27am
DeleteSyvret has called for many things, including the prosecution of multiple and serious offenders whom the establishment saw fit to let off.
If calling for a public inquiry, the implication is that they meant one based on good practice and on basic and sound legal principles?
If I remember correctly, it was Frank Walker back in 2008 who said there would be an inquiry. Sorry if I am wrong.
DeleteDraft statement from Walker
Delete“Thirdly, the Council has decided to accept the recommendation of the Health and Social Services Minister, that a Committee of Enquiry should be established..."
Ok I was wrong. Perhaps Stuart knows more now than he did then? At the time an inquiry would seem a natural and hopeful step forward to sorting out the fundamental issues and apportioning the rule of law. But of course we assumed it to be a good inquiry and this one is not living up to that benchmark.
Delete"So you think Syvret was wrong to call for a public inquiry?"
ReplyDeleteDid he call for one? An inquiry into what? Perhaps you would be so good as to provide a link?
To answer your question in the abstract, IF he called for a public inquiry into child abuse in Jersey with the intention that it should be used instead of the normal process of the police investigating and charging child abusers, the attorney general prosecuting them, and the courts convicting those found guilty during a fair trial, then YES - he was wrong.
Stuart's blog 'Jerseys public inquiry into child abuse'
ReplyDeleteQuote. "You will see that I knew then that only an external investigation would stand any chance of addressing the child-protection failures. I went on to propose that a Committee of Inquiry should be established.
Thus it is that the work of this Committee of Inquiry begins six-and-a-half years after I had intended – in my capacity as Minister for Health & Social Services – that there should be such an Inquiry."
Thank you.
DeleteThat blog from June 2014 is well worth a read
http://freespeechoffshore.nl/stuartsyvretblog/jerseys-public-inquiry-into-child-abuse/
as is the one from March 2014
http://freespeechoffshore.nl/stuartsyvretblog/the-publics-inquiry-into-the-public-inquiry-starts-here/
Yawn.
ReplyDeleteThe chronology - the evidence - the evolution of the events referred to above - is there - already shown - in the published evidence.
We don't need a "public inquiry" to be happening now.
The Jersey "public inquiry" is redundant.
What we need - what the rule-of-law needs - is simply for Philip Bailhache, Michael Birt, William Bailhache, Andrew Ridgeway, Christopher Pitchers, Tim Le Cocq, Bill Ogley. Ian Le Marquand - etc - etc - to arrested, charged and prosecuted as the heavily evidenced, prima facie criminals they are.
We need a system which is structurally - theoretically - capable of undertaking those actions.
They way things have unfolded - a public inquiry is simply redundant. I agree with the commenter above: we don't need a public inquiry - we simply need the effective, objective rule of law.
Stuart
So when did you change your view with regard to the need for a public inquiry?
DeleteAccording to the quote you provided, Stuart Syvret asked for a public inquiry into child-protection failures. The current COI is into child abuse in Jersey's care system. I presume you are intelligent enough to see that they are very different animals. An inquiry into child protection failures would focus primarily on the delivery of services - including those provided to children not in care but at risk of abuse; the current inquiry is focused on the abuse itself, and is clearly intended to be a substitute for proper application of the criminal justice system.
DeleteIn a functioning democracy with a robust and independent policing and judicial system, criminal behaviour relating to child abuse - including any unlawful behaviour of civil servants, crown officers and states members in seeking to cover-up abuse - should be dealt with through the criminal justice system.
Instead of asking passive-aggressive questions that you clearly think are a clever trap to highlight an inconsistency of approach, why don't you make a positive contribution? What does it matter if Stuart Syvret called for an inquiry several years ago? What does it matter even if he has changed his mind (it's what intelligent people do when presented with emerging facts that conflict with their previous views); or if he has changed his mind, when he changed?
Come on, don't be shy. Why don't you tell us whether you think the current COI is worth supporting, and if so, why? If you think Stuart Syvret should engage with the COI, argue your point.
'Come on, don't be shy. Why don't you tell us whether you think the current COI is worth supporting, and if so, why? If you think Stuart Syvret should engage with the COI, argue your point. '
ReplyDeletePerhaps because it would be in the interests of the victims of abuse whom he professes to represent and would benefit from his input, rather than his own personal crusade of toppling the Jersey establishment ?
"Perhaps because it would be in the interests of the victims of abuse whom he professes to represent and would benefit from his input, rather than his own personal crusade of toppling the Jersey establishment ?"
DeleteProfesses to represent? There isn't a single person on this island who has done more to represent, support and fight for victims of abuse in this island, and the best you can say is he "professes to represent"? How incredibly small of you.
So, tell me how Stuart giving evidence to such an obviously flawed inquiry will do anything for any of the victims? What exactly will his testimony do to benefit them, given that he has published reams of evidence, all of which is available to the COI. Do you think his engagement with the COI will lead to the prosecution of a single abuser, since the police already have his evidence? Do you think it will lead to the dismissal of a single jobsworth civil servant who either ignored clear evidence of abuse, or actively worked to bury it? Do you think it will cause the UK government to review its oversight of the island's criminal justice system to remove the structural conflicts of interest and cronyism that allow abuse to flourish and go unpunished?
Of course not. The COI will produce a draft report; it will be circulated to a select few, toned-down to the point of inanity, and once published will be waved by establishment todies as drawing a line under the matter, and that we can all move on. And quietly drop the notion of prosecuting child rapists who happen to have the right mates.
Stuart has chosen the only path that might actually produce tangible results: legal action in the UK. The deck is stacked against him and it's likely he will fail, but at least he's doing something. What are you doing?
No offence to the victims of abuse They are (hopefully), being looked after by the Committee of Inquiry, into victims of abuse. But, accept or not, SS is focusing onto the much bigger picture of Judicial, Political, Legal & Police corruption & cover-up. Corruption & cover-up, not only in Jersey but also in London & UK. Leave him to deal with it as he intends to. After all without him we would not be having this COI, nor would we be this far advanced!?
ReplyDeleteTo those who get carried away with the idea that - somehow - it's vital - for some reason - that I as an individual should engage with the Jersey child-abuse "public inquiry" - the "CoI" - I recommend you go to the following URL and read the Guardian article about the experiences of Don Hale: -
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/jul/15/daily-star-sunday-cyril-smith
Don was a regional newspaper editor in the early 1980s. He was handed a dossier of evidence on high-level child-abuse and child-abuse cover-ups. The dossier was given to him by the respected senior Labour party figure Barbra Castle.
Before he could publish the evidence and the stories, he was oppressed by the forces of the British Establishment. As he himself explains in the linked article, after a threating and intimidating visit by the child-rapist MP Cyril Smith failed to silence him - UK Special Branch police officers came to his office, threatened him, and seized the dossier of evidence.
Why do I mention this?
The London law-firm running the Jersey CoI - the island's supposed "public inquiry" into child-abuse - Eversheds LLP - are lawyers for UK Special Branch.
Do I need to spell it out?
The so-called "public inquiry" into child-abuse cover-ups in Jersey which we were supposed to trust is - to all practical intents and purposes - UK Special Branch.
Stuart
Behind the thin veneer of freedom and democracy we have a Stasi of the powerful
DeleteA Secret Police to the royal and political classes
Their role is "protection", not the detection and punishment of crime.
Eversheds are the retained lawyers for those who protect, and cover up the rape (or worse) of children
and no doubt any other fetish, corruption or sleaze.
I have made two separate statements to the COI both of which supported the allegations of child victims of horrifying sexual abuse. So I don't need lectures about making a positive contribution by someone who seems to support the view of others that this public inquiry is a waste of space and it is only those of lesser intelligence who would wish to support it because they lack the insight and vision of those dissenters of higher intelligence. I actually believe that the evidence that I and others like me have given to the COI has been invaluable to those children who suffered sexual abuse at hdlg and that this inquiry has made a real difference to those victims whose voices were ignored for so many decades. At long last they can be heard.
ReplyDelete@23:46 Thank you and well done.
DeleteHaving made statements to the CoI (presumably under your own name?) and in public domain documents, why do you choose to comment anonymously here?
There are entirely valid reasons for posting anonymously, not least the unwarranted attention of Jersey's Secret-paedo-Police (link above)
If you do not want to use your real identity you can sign your posts with a random name such as "Philip" or more randomly "Wendy". Then discussions on this blog will actually make sense.
Otherwise your righteous indignation is just another 'soundbite' which readers will either believe or disbelieve.
Can we assume that you are the commenter apparently taunting Mr.Syvret into signing up to this CoI's protocols?
When it became apparent that there were serious questions over this CoI's fitness for purpose, my recollection is that Mr.Syvret said/wrote that it was a difficult call to decide what to do and that each individual had to make a personal choice as to whether to engage with "the CoI process".
He respects other people's choices. Why can't you (or other anonymous commenter) respect his?
We (as a movement for justice and child protection) are proud of you and anyone who lifts a proverbial finger for the benefit of others, but are you convinced that you have greater insight, higher morals and more experience and sacrifice than Mr.Syvret?
Discussion is healthy but please be sensitive of foisting your chosen path on others.
It is probably simplistic to constrain belief to your path being correct OR Mr.Syvret's path being correct.
My view is that both paths are correct. They are parallel paths pushing in the same direction and ultimately heading to the same destination
What would certainly demonstrate "lesser intelligence", would be to fight amongst ourselves.
They are not stupid and the know this. It is called "divide and rule"
New blog posting by Ex. Met Officer and politician, Bob Hill
ReplyDeletehttp://bobhilljersey.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/independent-jersey-care-inquiry-12.html
"One of the interesting features emerging from the Committee of Inquiry (COI) Hearings is the variation in witnesses’ ability to recall events from the past. Some had a good memory, some a poor and on occasions it has been evident some had a selective memory.
Selective memory is often a convenient way of temporarily forgetting something which is expedient to forget. It was not that long ago that a senior Minister was unable to recall what he was reading on the plane. Even more recently he was unable to recall a conversation with the former Education Chief who claimed they had spoken about not reporting an allegation of abuse to the police.
In October the COI will be listening to some very interesting witnesses who will be commenting on the collusion between senior civil servants and Ministers and will be questioning the integrity of Ministers and the Council of Ministers in particular."
The rest of the posting is "small beer", unless you are in that industry.
Found this from the link provided by VFC above.
ReplyDeletehttp://chosen.org.uk/watch_film/
Every teacher and parent at Vic College should watch that Channel 4 documentary film
It documents how a child can be ambushed and then made complicit in the abuse. It documents the the confusion, the fear, the guilt, the revulsion and the lifelong consequences.
It documents why the child can't tell the parents.
It documents why the school covers up.
It documents how naive youngsters can be and how how easy it is to groom the parents.
Slow but stunning. Now there's a film project worth financing.
Thank you VFC.
I haven't yet seen the film, but I will watch it.
DeleteWhat I can say with certainty right now is that the conduct of Victoria College and a number of senior figures, including certain staff and governors, was unspeakably reprehensible; cowardly - ethically bankrupt.
Stuart
Of the dozens (possibly hundreds) of small boys who passed through this exclusive private school and were interfered with or raped, these three men came forward. All were from the privileged classes (upper middle) and none could speak of the sexual predation they suffered until their own parents had died. There were several reasons for this, one being that it was the parents blind trust in a revered institution which allowed them to be abused and for the abuse to go on for years and to happen to so many boys.
DeleteOne of the abusers was recently imprisoned, but only after several decades working in other private schools. The ex.headmaster was let off due to the passage of time apparently making the case difficult. Tom's rather refined voice observes "but I can describe his genitalia in great detail"
There are some unexpected emotions displayed and despite having moved on and raised families these men remain deeply affected as adults in late middle age.
Ex Conservative MP Harvey Proctor, referred to by some in the gay community as "Harvey Proctorscope" and "HP the Sadist" has gone on the attack after his 2nd police interview with a pre-prepared press statement refuting the allegations that he was actively involved in the abuse, torture and even several murders of boys.
ReplyDeleteHP's statement and Q&A of yesterday is published in full by Exaro News
www.exaronews.com/articles/5650/harvey-proctor-i-am-a-homosexual-i-am-not-a-murderer
HP claims that the investigation is part of a witch hunt against gays and HP's own statement is unusual in that it lists in quite graphic detail some of the allegations against him.
Exaro News have stated that there are a number of errors/untruths in his statement/Q&A but that they will not identify them as this could contaminate evidence. The unusual publication of the detail of the allegations by Harvey Proctor could be for a number of reasons, including potentially to contaminate or devalue evidence of any other boys coming forward.
Harvey Proctor may be totally innocent (notwithstanding his previous conviction for underage boys) but Exaro and the police do not seem to regard the witness 'Nick' as "a fantasist".
It seems counter intuitive but in perpetrating crimes against voiceless groups, children, convicts, residents of mental institutions, a perpetrator can reduce their risk of detection by making the crimes extreme and therefore "beyond belief" to normal people. The complainant can then be labelled as "disturbed" and dismissed at the drop of a case.
Another historic way of guaranteeing indemnity is to involve other influential people.
The detail of the Proctor allegations makes Linda Corby and Ted Vibert's concerns about the Ted Heath/Savile Jersey boat trips additionally worrying in the local context.
The Exaro News link is not recommended for those of a delicate disposition.
The former Senator "Vibert" mentioned in your comment was "Ralph" Vibert and not Red Vibert.
DeleteThank you for the link to the Exaro News ARTICLE.
Sorry for the typo, that is "Ted" not "Red" Vibert.
DeleteLinda Corby's blog went down for several days (maybe just due to a renewal issue).
ReplyDeletehttp://lcorby.com/2015/08/04/will-the-jersey-police-continue-to-cover-up-for-edward-heath/
Now Ex.Health Minister Stuart Syvret's blog is showing the message:
"This Account Has Been Suspended"
http://freespeechoffshore.nl/stuartsyvretblog/jack-straw-and-the-illegal-jersey-child-abuse-cover-up/
On the UK scene there may be a co-ordinated rearguard action with convicted sadist.rent boy abuser and liar ex.MP Harvey Proctor issuing a statement and leaving the UK for an unspecified European country.
www.exaronews.com/articles/5650/harvey-proctor-i-am-a-homosexual-i-am-not-a-murderer
Linda is back up. Stuart getting too close to the bone?
DeleteStuart says on Twitter that the international people who run the (not his) account say the current interruption is a glitch and is expected to be fixed.
Deletewww.exaronews.com/articles/5648/found-more-secret-files-on-allegations-of-sex-offences-by-vips
Deletewww.exaronews.com/articles/5398/ex-mi6-chief-named-as-sexual-abuser-of-boys-at-dolphin-square
www.exaronews.com/articles/5420/revealed-buried-files-link-buckingham-palace-to-paedophilia
www.exaronews.com/articles/5363/conservative-conference-faces-fresh-claims-over-paedophile-mps
www.exaronews.com/articles/5464/leon-brittan-was-under-met-probe-over-claims-of-child-sex-abuse
www.exaronews.com/articles/5641/video-esther-baker-on-how-police-have-stepped-up-abuse-case
Stuart's blog (not his !) is back up.
ReplyDeleteConservative MP does the right thing and goes to the police
ReplyDeletewww.exaronews.com/articles/5653/police-investigate-senior-labour-mp-for-charging-constituents
There has been much talk about Stuart not giving evidence to the COI but isn't this all rather academic since virtually all of his evidence is already in his blog and readily available to the COI
ReplyDeleteInterestingly on day 93 page 94 of the COI questioning of Mr Joualt the COI have quoted an exert from Stuart's blog. In other words Stuart does not have to appear in person for his evidence to be heard.
That is interesting. So the blog they tried to close down is evidence!
DeleteBut importantly
"In other words Stuart does not have to appear in person for [SOME OF] his evidence to be heard."
They have dug themselves into a deeper hole.
The COI does not resume until 8th of this month. Yet Mr Joualt is sited making his way to the COI base most morning this week.
ReplyDeleteDoes this make him an essential, can't do without....
Member of the COI team?!
A reader says: -
Delete"The COI does not resume until 8th of this month. Yet Mr Jouault is sited making his way to the COI base most morning this week.
Does this make him an essential, can't do without....
Member of the COI team?!"
It would be more informative and accurate to describe the fatally conflicted Richard Jouault being sighted making his way to the COI base - which is conveniently right next door to the rear entrance of The Ogier Group - both syndicates operating, conveniently, out of the same office building: -
http://freespeechoffshore.nl/stuartsyvretblog/the-ogier-group/
A remarkable "coincidence", no?
I hope Frances Oldham has professional friends - or family members perhaps - who she listens to, and who might rescue her from this stark folly of the kind so often embraced by people who are possessed of wholly delusional high opinions of them selves.
She's a fool - a disposable fool - floundering in a see of sharks.
The "public inquiry" she's running is already self-destroyed - never being able to obtain vires - from the day she signed the ultra vires, ex cathedra "Protocols" they dreamt up in lawless defiance of Part (e) of the Legislative decision.
Those who selected her did so for precisely those properties. Especially the self-delusion. It's a common gambit. That, and the lack of a real understanding on the "useful idiot's" part, of the true nature of the epochal maelstrom their stepping into.
If that weren't the case - she wouldn't be running a "public inquiry" into decades of concealed child abuse - from a set of rooms with connecting doors to an evidencedly corrupted law-firm directly involved in those decades of child-abuse cover-ups, The Ogier Group, So much so involved, they corrupted judicial authority to "endorse" the illegal suspension of a good Police Chief - so as to protect an immensely wealthy and powerful, violent rapist client of the Ogier Group.
Frances Oldham needs rescuing, rescuing from herself - rescuing by those who care enough about her to want to set her on the path of perhaps salvaging something of the fag-end of her professional and human reputations.
Those objectives are toast if she clings on to the Jersey CoI which has already crashed & burned, with her at the helm.
Stuart Syvret
Stuart you have said you want no part of this Inquiry over and over again.
DeleteYou even sent a letter to them telling them all to resign remember, which they ignored.
You have done your best to dissuade people from taking it seriously which has also been ignored.
But why still talk about it if you hold such feelings? You don't make any sense.
@07:45
DeleteI think you will find that Stuart is entitled to his opinion and furthermore is entitled to tell the world about it.
Entitled despite the judicial corruption and dysfunction which enabled the illegal superinjunctions against his public interest disclosures. Click the above "HERE" to listen to one of the more harmless beneficiaries of one of the corrupt (and "publicly" funded!) Jersey superinjunctions.
Anonymous @07:45 says "You [Stuart] don't make any sense"
On the contrary, Stuart's position has a devastating logic to it. What REALLY doesn't make any sense (to those NOT seeking further cover-up) is to squander £6 million (or is it £15 million now?) on a CoI which is so defective from the outset and now further undermined by the CoI now being filter-fed by proven cover-up merchants like Richard Jouault and Tony Le Sueur, who are themselves under investigation.
In recent comments Mr.Syvret has suggested that the litany of schoolboy/schoolgirl errors is down to the incompetence of senior member(s) of the CoI team.
Lack of competence is a valid interpretation but so is gullibility and lack if judgement and fibre.
What I hear is that the team lead was assured that it would be all okay by a slack jawed hick in a suit. They might have shown a bit more fortitude but the Jersey hick was holding a fat (and publicly funded) chequebook.
This CoI has provided some benefits but due to deliberate incompetence it represents exceedingly poor value for money for the taxpayer.
The CoI has been immensely profitable for some, but it will be interesting to see how (and if) the senior CoI team can extricate themselves.They have chosen to sip from the poison chalice. Now spit or swallow?
Yes Stuart is entitled to his opinions but why constantly slag the inquiry off if he is not going to partake?
DeleteWouldn't it be better if he attended the Inquiry and said his pieces there so its all recorded?
No idea why you are obsessed with Mr H, he's got no connections as far as I can see to either the COI or historic abuse, so maybe you can expand on that one?
@ Anonymous 19:28
DeleteIt is unlikely that anyone is "obsessed with Mr H". However he is interesting from a professional viewpoint and also because of how he fits into the Jersey picture. Authorities with any sympathy and morals would offer him counselling and treatment rather than use him as a 'tool' for their own dubious ends.
Mr H also remains of interest to the taxpayer until such time as he (or the shysters responsible for welcoming him on board) pay back his share of the £300,000+ wasted on his flawed superinjunction against the Ex.Health Minister.
If I can expand further; Mr H's connections with Team-Peado and Team-CoverUp and his hate campaign against child protection campaigners and even against abuse survivors make Mr H very much a part of the landscape and a part of not so "historic" abuse.
That you (or others) repeatedly ask these questions indicates that you have little understanding of the situation so it is not surprising that the Ex.Health Minister is not taking your advice regarding the CoI.
ReplyDeleteTHE ROLE OF RICHARD JOUAULT AND TONY LE SUEUR - AND WHAT EXACTLY ARE THEY DOING????
Dep. Andrew Green says on BBC Jsy radio that we don't need a Children's Minister as it will take up office space.
ReplyDeleteBut to be fair, can you name a current Minister who is not just "taking up office space"
Delete