FOR some inexplicable reason the number of unemployed in the Island seems to be rising in tandem with property prices.

This week, we are told, the number of jobless is at an all-time high, having risen ten per cent in the past month alone.

Moreover, the 1,300 who are currently on the register do not include people who have been made redundant in the finance industry, because in the main those with finance qualifications tend to register with specialist employment agencies, rather than the Social Security department.

What may have caused this sudden jobless surge is difficult to pinpoint. But we do know that a quarter of those on the register are teenagers and, in any case, if previous estimates are anything to go by, it is likely that up to 50% of the total are under the age of 25. These are people who will have been approached to join one or other of the various States schemes that started at the end of last year. But once the training/job experience has come to an end, what then? Not all of those are going to be able to find full-time work.

Another group that seem to have fallen through the net are skilled/semi-skilled tradesmen, for whom the work has simply dried up.

At the same time, we are now seeing an increase in properties valued at way above £1 million. It’s almost as if the £1 million figure has become the new £500,000, as a benchmark price. Many of these are properties that already had planning permission and which have been upgraded or rebuilt in the hope that enough people with enough cash in hand will be queuing up to buy them.

Given the propensity for the UK government to increase the taxes of its wealthier residents – and given this week’s Budgetary measure to bring in 50% tax for earners of £150,000 per annum or more – there may well be a trickle of incomers prepared to sever all previous ties with the mainland.

Equally, there will be few first-time buyers, or even second- or third-time buyers, who have sufficient wherewithal to contemplate purchasing properties now on the market.
It must be clear to anyone with even a short-sighted view of the economy that the rift between the haves and have-nots is widening, seriously and more quickly than we may have envisaged.

It would not take much to cement this gap with what was described to me some time ago as a burgeoning waterfront ‘ghetto’ of blocks of flats, with accompanying vandalism, noise nuisance and hooliganism, far away from the peaceful country mansions occupied by those who have themselves been influential in engineering this social divide.

Meanwhile, our government seems more than content to let it happen.

It’s enough to make a zebra cross
WHAT is happening to our pedestrian crossings?

I say this as a pedestrian who uses the crossings at Five Oaks on average twice every weekday.

Time was when motorists knew the rules of the road – and obeyed them. But all this seems to have changed, certainly over the past year or so. And it isn’t just me – only this week a letter to the Editor appeared on this subject and, I am reliably informed, the authorities have been noticing an increase in accidents at crossings, too.

What seems to happen to me, on a regular basis, is that I stand purposefully on the pavement waiting for the black and white stripes/red lights to register in the minds of oncoming vehicle drivers. To no avail, because none of them seems inclined to stop.
In fact the reaction of motorists seems to fit into three categories: a) speed up; b) carry straight on, with a vacant look; or c), screech to a halt at the edge of the crossing, grinning.

I do wonder whether these appalling driving habits have migrated from mainland Europe. For instance, in France, as we all know, you need to actually step off the pavement into the path of incoming cars before they will consider stopping. And in Italy, I do believe, the only reason drivers will stop at all is to prevent your bloodied limbs from staining their pristine bumpers and bonnets.

So I have a suggestion. Why not install some of these smiley-faced electronic speed indication devices in the approach to pedestrian crossings? I, for one, quite like them – they are a friendly, non-invasive way of reminding me to cut back from a roaring 31 mph.

It shouldn’t really be necessary to remind people to slow down – and you would think that zebras and beacons would be enough – but clearly everyone has so much on their minds these days that it will take nothing short of an explosion to make them pay attention.