Deputy's article was insensitive to elderly
ONE OF my friends asked me if I had read a recent article published in the Press written by brand-new deputy, Emily Yerby, 'Diary of a new States member'. Well, I hadn't bothered to read it actually and the paper had long since been recycled, but he insisted that I should read it, so I went and found the piece. I could not believe what I was reading. She began by saying that she wrote her manifesto (for the 2016 election) wrapped up in a blanket in a cold bed and breakfast in Edinburgh.
She then went on to say, 'It's cold again now. Winter has crept into my flat. When I am working at home between meetings, I'm wrapped up in as many layers as an artist in a garret – the last bar on my electric heater sputtered out two weeks ago and I haven't yet had the time to get it fixed or replaced.'
All I can say is, welcome to the real world, Deputy Yerby.
Hundreds of Guernsey pensioners spend the entire winter living in just such primitive conditions, and not by choice.
The fact that Deputy Yerby receives £30,000-plus per annum makes her remarks even more unbelievably insensitive to their plight.
To give her the benefit of the doubt, perhaps she is trying to experience just what it feels like to be frail and elderly, a pensioner, living on a very low or fixed income, unable to replace heating equipment or having sufficient money to buy electric, gas or coal to keep warm throughout the winter? But I doubt it.
I have very little, if any, confidence in someone like this deputy being capable of looking after our island who, it seems, is unable to manage her own affairs appropriately.
Fortunately, we do have a few dedicated deputies who tackle the pensioners heating crisis every year and do all they can to help. We owe a big thank-you to Deputy Lester Queripel and others like him, who live in the real world and acknowledge the deprivation experienced by some of their fellow islanders and try to do something about it.
I hope this new Deputy Yerby thinks twice before putting pen to paper again and that the Guernsey Press does likewise before publishing anything similar again.
JANINE LE SAUVAGE,
Meadow View,
Les Hubits de Bas,
St Martin's
GY4 6NB.
Editor's footnote: Deputy Emilie Yerby responds: This letter is fundamentally right: our comfortable deputies' salaries shield us from the realities experienced by more than half the island's workforce, who earn incomes at or below the Guernsey average, which is little more than £31,000 – never mind those who are on limited incomes because they are pensioners, or because they cannot work due to poor health or caring responsibilities. It's a point I've raised in the States myself, and I'm sorry that your reader felt I was making light of it.
I'm a member of the Committee for Employment & Social Security, so I'm concerned by this letter's implication that I don't care about people who are living in difficult circumstances, and not through their own choice – after all, it is our committee's responsibility to improve the lives of those people. If there's anything I've done (apart from the column) which has given your reader cause for concern about my commitment to that important responsibility, I'd invite them to contact me personally so that we can talk it over.
At the Press' invitation, I've been writing a monthly column since May, with the aim of providing a window on the ordinary life of an elected member. Through that, I hope to make politics feel more accessible and achievable to people who are considering entering it in future. That requires me to be candid about my own challenges and flaws, to paint a rounded picture – so if people like your reader wish to draw conclusions about my political work based on how I prioritise my domestic life, or anything else I include in those columns, they have every right to do so.
