Develop old vineries before reclaiming bay

1. A deep-water berth to unload our fuel. (I was given to understand that this berth was going to be built at St Sampson's Harbour, close to the fuel companies' premises. Mmmm.)

2. Another hotel. (Another one? But some of our hotels are closing due to lack of business.)

3. A conference centre. (We already have one and it's never fully booked.)

4. More facilities for visitors and residents. (What kind of facilities? Plus, if more are needed, why can't we just build them now anyway?)

5. To improve transport links. (How? And again, why can't we do that now anyway?)

6. To create extra parking. (But the new idealistic and totally unrealistic transport strategy seeks to get us all out of our cars and on to buses, pushbikes or on foot, the intention being that there will then be fewer cars to park in our Town. Plus, the Public Services Department, in its infinite wisdom, has taken away car-parking spaces from North Beach and sees no justifiable reason to reinstall or reinstate them. So there seems to be something of a contradiction there somewhere, I feel, and even possibly a lack of 'joined-up thinking'.)

Deputy Stewart also says we have 'limited land to develop on-island'. But that is simply not the case.

We have 234 disused vineries in Guernsey, many of them totally derelict, with greenhouses completely flattened and overgrown with brambles. (Deputy Stewart's department, Commerce and Employment, has those details on file). In fact, I rode around the parishes of St Peter Port, Castel, St Sampson's and the Vale recently on my push bike and discovered that there are 17 derelict vineries in those four parishes alone, with a combined totally useless land mass (in their current state) five times as big as Sausmarez Park.

That's half the size of Belle Greve Bay in four parishes.

A couple more things before I go.

If my memory serves me correctly, the lady who runs the bakery and cafe in Track Lane once put an advertising board on the pavement on the seaward side of the coast road and she was told to remove it by the Environment Department because it spoilt the view of the islands.

How will the developers get around that sort of approach, Kev?

Mind you, your own department was involved, along with the Environment Department, in refusing developers permission to convert local hotels into much-needed care homes recently, which was just as ludicrous.

To finish my letter in 'tongue in cheek mode': perhaps we should reclaim the whole bay right up to Herm. Then we could walk there, instead of having to get on a boat.

I rest my case, Kev. Now it's over to you.

DEPUTY LESTER QUERIPEL,

lesterqueripel@cwgsy.net.