Lives ‘will be put at risk’
Friday 31st December 2010, 2:58PM GMT.
Barry Jenkins outside the Lifeguards' station at St Ouen's Bay. Picture: Rob Currie (01121324)
LIVES will be put at risk and Jersey’s reputation as a safe holiday destination will suffer if the States make irresponsible funding cuts to the beach lifeguard service, a veteran surfer says today.
Barry Jenkins, who was a volunteer lifeguard in the 1960s and has been a beach user all of his life, gave the stark warning following a JEP report yesterday about plans to slash the service’s budget by £80,000.
In that report, Economic Development Minister Alan Maclean said that the whole service was being reviewed and various options were on the table, ranging from withdrawing lifeguard cover from some beaches to handing the service over to the RNLI to run.
‘The issue is safety,’ said Mr Jenkins. ‘What experience are the people or person in charge going to have of Jersey? The service will be downgraded in terms of the experience of local waters and perhaps in terms of the experience and qualifications that the lifeguards need to operate.
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just when you thought it was safe to go in the water
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Museums closed in winter, lifeguards gone in summer? What is a tourist going to do ?
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And here is a guy who knows exactly what he is talking about,Barry and Gordon Burgess.,Big Bill Laverack all those beach surfers and lifesavers had worked with the Oz Guards ….this proposition by Alan Maclean must be dropped…anyone underestimates that beach at their peril.get real.
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Didn’t they have a celebration of 50 years service this year,was someone thinking ahead politically!!
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As someone who has surfed at St Ouen’s beach year round for the last 25 years, I think this proposition is poorly thought out. The number of people surfing in Jersey has increased dramatically over the last 5 years and the life guard cover is needed now more than ever. HOWEVER, it would make much more sense for the life guards to be local people who are trained to do the job as this would be much more cost effective. IT MAKES NO SENSE to employ Australians to do the job when locals know these waters much better than anyone. Can you imagine an Australian local authority only employing UK lifeguards?? There would be absolute outrage. The States need to break away from this notion that they have to import skills into the island when we have people here already who are more than capable of filling these posts.
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Lifeguards are an essential service, throughout my time as a States of Jersey Beach lifeguard I have worked with locals, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans who have all gained the proper qualifications and EXPERIENCE.
Some previous blogs have stated that our flights and accomodation are paid for, this is untrue. The full cost of flights and accomodation has been paid in full by ourselves each and every year.
A major part of the Beach Lifeguard role is prevention. Cutting the service may result in using the other serices which would take time to get there and could result in drownings.
Enjoy a safe summer of swimming!
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the states are truly trying to turn everyone against them.we are been seen as a laughung stock by others.keep the life guards and make cuts elsewhere.The abbattoir for instance can be privatetised as currently people are flown over from the uk on a weekly basis,flights,hotel,wages
why is nothing said here.Already a big saving.You would not have a garage and fly over machanics!!!.I suppose this is a states THING!!!.This just the tip of the ice burge of what we dont know of what is going on
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Well it looks as if the lifeguard service will go before the mighty dollar or in your case the pound. It will only take one person to drown and will that be worth the savings? As for employing locals good idea and that’s it Dave a good idea. What you have to rember is the majority of the lifeguards do this job 12 months of the year and it’s their full time employment. You can not get the experiance with people who are going to do it for 4 months of the year.This will be a decided by politions and we all know what that means.
PS British lifeguards have been employed in OZ
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This is not a battle of Australian lifeguards versus locals. I am sure if all the lifeguards were local we would still have the same problem.The States have set in motion a programme of outsourcing and the lifeguard service is seen as an easy target. Just remember what happened to the workers at Jersey Water and JT WHO WERE MADE REDUNDANT and then reemloyed at much lower rates of pay the following day.
Ted Vibert will tell you the reasons behind this zero/ten. The coffers are bare thanks to the gross mismanagement of the economy by Messrs LeSuer and Ozouf and others who have supported their misplaced views. They were warned back in 2003 that zero/ten was unlikely to be approved but showed callous disregard to anyone who didn’t agree with the establishment.
Back to the lifeguard saga,it is fairly evident that lifeguards are a necessity that we can not do without so yes if their are some locals with the right qualifications and experience levels it is only right that they be considered for any positions that may be come available providing of course it is at the correct rate of pay.
You may also not be aware that i have been told that quite a few of the Aussie guards are actually British
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again and again!!!
incompetent decisions made by incompetent politicians !!
at the first death this summer those politicians should be held responsible and taken to court !!!
maybe those politicians should cut by £5000 per year the wages of every civil servant and every politician – how much money this will bring to Jersey ?
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The job of the life guard is to provide a Safe Aquatic experience for all beach users and this can only be achieved by employing EXPERIENCED LIFEGUARDS who can recognise where trouble is going to occur and advise people of the dangers.Experienced lifeguards have on their daily report logs lots of preventative actions and no rescues they achieve this by their experience of knowing and being able to see dangerous situations before they occur and preventing the rescues from having to be made. Before making the decision on whether the Australian Lifeguards are re-employed or if the RLNI are going to be used look at the statistics and see how many preventative action have been performed over the years by the Australian Lifeguards that could have been rescues or possible tragedies and ask yourselves are we going to get this level of experience and professionalism from another provider and I know the answer will be NO.
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