‘You gave in too easily’
Saturday 12th December 2009, 3:00PM GMT.
Questions have been raised as to why Jersey did not fight harder to retain the reciprocal health arrangement
JERSEY’S ministers should have fought harder to protect the reciprocal health deal with the UK instead of meekly accepting its cancellation, according to a UK MP.
Backbench Labour MP Andrew Mackinlay says that Island politicians should have done more to protect the deal which ended in April.
He has been asking questions in the House of Commons about the end of the arrangement, which meant that Jersey and UK residents are no longer entitled to free health care in each other’s jurisdictions.
As of 1 April this year, Islanders have had to pay for all treatment in the UK outside of accident and emergency – although students will continue to get free care. But Mr Mackinlay is baffled that Jersey politicians did not kick up a fuss at the end of an arrangement that had lasted for 30 years.
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Yes we did – we should have fought to retain the status quo… We have to be tougher in situations such as these.
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Wouldn’t they have had to be competent to have fought on our behalf, from what I’ve seen I remain unconvinced that they even understood the arrangement.
Is it not reinstatable?
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Since when have the politicians been worried about the welfare of the people !?!?
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There are very few Jersey Politicians who have any back bone. The have little or no tenacity when fighting for the rights and welfare of islanders…..acquiescence is all many of our Deputies and Senators know, as is shown in the above news report.
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Having benefitted from your superb health service when visiting Jersey, we are the losers. Our Government trying to save few quid again. Perhaps they think only rich bankers come to Jersey from the UK.
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I have to say I was pretty disgusted my this change when it happened, being Jersey born and resident until two years ago and having paid social security for 15 years before I left I find it a bit much having to buy insurance to visit my own family in my homeland.
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It wasn’t the politicians that lost the reciprocal health agreement, it was the now deposed chief executive Mike Pollard.
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Well, it would seem that you need some kind of health care coverage if you are walking the streets of St. Helier these days…. What a pathetic example this has become of an islands complacent disregard for escallating bad social behaviour , alcohol and drugs seem to be the clear winner !
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I can see so many sides to this… However if Uk people do not have any rights when they live on the island IE buying houses etc then why should we let Jersey residents have the perks of our health service. Sorry the island can not have it both ways.
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….err because we don’t respect the housing rights of english people, and maintain a manifestly unfair housing apartheid system. We probably don’t deserve a reciprocal agreement because we don’t act fairly ourselves????
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#5 Ken, we (I was a UK taxpayer until early last year) were being stolen from… the UK Government would have been failing us if they’d let that continue. For once they got it right.
Presumably there would have been a chance to renegotiate if it wasn’t that Jersey proved they couldn’t be trusted? Maybe if we can get a new Government in place in Jersey they can be trusted enough to make some new arrangement.
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This Government needs to grow a backbone. This year has been a joke. The Stuart Syvret Carry on, why is he not sacked? The reciprical health agreement and the UK poking its nose into our tax affairs. Come on Jersey States members do something thats right for a change and take some action against all these wrongs for a change!
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FOXY and Quentin, this was a reciprocal agreement related to health care, not housing.
Do you think that the housing situation would be better if all housing regulations were scrapped? Remember, the Island is not getting any bigger (apart from the reclamation sites).
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Firstly, I do wish people would stop referring to all people from the British Isles and English there are a fair number of Welsh, Irish and Scottish people in Jersey as well as English.
I do feel politicians should have fought harder but they do not seem to be people who have had to fight for much in their lives. Most of them can probably afford private health care or insurance.
What concerns me most is that people are not in possession of all the facts. Yes treatment recommended in the UK is covered but should some other illness or accident befall you when there, there is no cover.
What a fiasco!
Ken Clarke – I feel the same when I go back to he UK.
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Leah Holmes (# 11) wonders “Maybe if we can get a new Government in place in Jersey they can be trusted enough to make some new arrangement”.
Jersey? Government? Trusted?
I have just seen a litter of 53 pigs flying over the Royal Square.
The three words above will NEVER go together, but Jersey, government and rank incompetence have done so for years.
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Well done, Phillip! Your economy of style is commendable.
To cram no less than five separate topics into two sentences has never been done before – at least in these columns.
That is not to say we disagree with any of them, though.
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I’m not surprised the ministers never pushed the issue. Jersey has been stealing from the UK for years. It would be tantamount to throwing a brick through a window and then knocking on the door and asking for the brick back! Talk about caught red-handed and red-faced – about time you Jersey lot started paying your own way!
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So now we know what our leaders are capable of doing,but no one taken to account for cooking the books
If it had been Joe public defrauding the gov in the same scale they would have thrown away the keys
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Marcus (#6) moans: I have to say I was pretty disgusted my this change when it happened, being Jersey born and resident until two years ago and having paid social security for 15 years before I left I find it a bit much having to buy insurance to visit my own family in my homeland”.
Why should Marcus receive free health services from the States of Jersey? Is he paying Social Security right now?
No, I di not think he is.
Patrimony counts for nothing. If Marcus does not currently pay anything in why should we subsidise him?
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#6 Marcus, you’re paying for the services you could receive at the time of payment really not for future help.
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