Public Hearing Transcript 09.11.07 - Mrs MacKenzie and Mrs Roscouet

STATES OF JERSEY

Education and Home Affairs Scrutiny Panel Early Years Review

Friday, 9th November 2007

Panel:

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian of St. Lawrence (Chairman) Deputy J.Gallichan of St. Mary

Deputy S. Pitman of St. Helier

Dr. C. Hamer (Panel Advisor)

Witnesses:

Mrs. L. Mackenzie Mrs. T. Roscouet

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian of St. Lawrence (Chairman):

I would like to welcome you formally to the Education and Home Affairs Scrutiny Panel. Thank you for coming to give us your views on the early years situation in Jersey. For your information the hearing is being recorded and it will be transcribed and a copy sent to you for you to verify that what we think or the transcriber thinks you said you did actually say. It will also become a public document, because it will be uploaded to the Scrutiny website. In front of you you have a copy of our terms of reference which you should have seen previously and there is also the protocol on the privilege that is accorded to witnesses at these hearings. These microphones are not to amplify our voices, they are purely for the purpose of recording so when you speak if you could aim your voice towards them, please, to make it clear. I think we will start by introducing ourselves. I am Deputy Mezbourian , the Chairman of the Panel and to my left is ...

Deputy J. Gallichan of St. Mary : Deputy Gallichan of St. Mary.

Dr. C. Hamer:

I am Dr. Cathy Hamer, I am an early years teacher and a childhood educational health psychologist specialising in early years. Currently I am working with the Early Childhood Unit at the National Children's Bureau.

Deputy S. Pitman of St. Helier :

I am Deputy Pitman of St. Helier.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Would you like to introduce yourselves, please?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Yes, certainly. My name is Trudi Roscouet. I have my own training and development company. I have 2 children, one of whom is 6 and one who is 2 and a half, so he is well into the early learning years.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

My name is Laurie McKenzie. I am a banker, for my sins. I have 2 children now aged 9 and 6 who have both been through private nursery education and are now at school.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Thank you. I think if you are happy to take this approach, we would be more than willing to give us your views and thoughts on the current strategy, process and procedures about early years. Is that how you have envisaged this hearing?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Yes, I mean I have not had a chance to speak to Laurie recently, but yes, I feel very strongly about what is happening and I have done for many, many years. In fact when my first, Dominic, was born the first point of legislation and which I joined the Jersey Child Care Trust to work with was to bring in maternity legislation which of course is not to be discussed now but is still outstanding to this day, which is quite horrendous as Jersey is being brought forward as a leading finance sector of the world. But as I say that is not to be discussed now. So, yes, it has been an area close to my heart for some time. Having worked briefly with Laurie we got together and realised that in fact this child care issue was something that was pretty significant and for the funding that we are talking about and the impact on what it would have on Jersey looking at a long term, rather than a short term, fix is quite significant. So, yes, I am quite happy to open the gambit, unless, Laurie, you want to go through some bits?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I first became involved when my eldest daughter had left nursery. She had attended Avranche Day Nursery which is a St. Helier non-profit making Parish nursery. My youngest daughter had just started at nursery and I have been very lucky in that I have worked for 2 employers ... during both of my children's births I was very lucky. I had good maternity leave, but still had to find a place for both of my children as a working mother in a nursery that could fit in with my working hours. A lot of the private sector nurseries for funding reasons have morning sessions, lunch time sessions and afternoon sessions. My working hours meant that I would always fall into the afternoon session and the cost of that would then be so prohibitive that I would then have to work full time, so my hours are 9.15 a.m. to 2.15 p.m. at the present time. They were 9.00 a.m. to 2.00 p.m. but obviously by the time you then leave work, get your car and get to nursery I was then hitting the afternoon sessions. Avranche was one of the few nurseries that you paid by the hour so you could tailor your hours to suit your working needs. I could collect my children as soon as I could to spend as much time with them as I then could in the afternoons. A lot of the other nurseries, by the time you then pay for that afternoon session you have to work to pay for it, so it was one of the few that suited my needs and I was very lucky that I lived in the Parish at the time and I could get a place, because obviously the Parish nurseries give priority to the Parishioners first and foremost. It was while my second daughter had started nursery that the issue of States nursery classes came to the fore, because the nursery was finding that they were losing a huge number of their 3 to 4 year-olds predominantly from parents who were both working, some doing more than one job to try and pay their mortgages et cetera, who did not want to move their children and in fact in moving them they were making a huge commitment to no longer having a family holiday, because to cover the outside of term time, both parents were having to take their holidays separately to cover the holidays. Because obviously a 3 or 4 year-old does not qualify for an after school or holiday club place. They have to be school age, so unless you are in a very lucky position that you work term-time only, which is like gold dust, taking a place at a nursery like that for somebody like myself, even if I was offered a place, would be impossible. My husband and I both are not Jersey born, we have no family here, so for us a place in a States nursery class is just impossible. For those local people who have managed to accept a place, some work full-time, some work part-time but covering the holidays meant no family holiday. If they were lucky grandparents or aunties picking up and dropping off if it did not suit in with working hours and covering holidays. It just seemed to me, I was very lucky in having a place where my children were cared ... I mean, they still go back to nursery now, they still want to go back and see the carers who looked after them. For parents not to have the choice purely a lot of them for financial reasons to be able to choose where to place their child I thought was completely inequitable and the parents at the nursery got together and as a group decided that we would try and do something about it. With some of the parents from Westmount Day Nursery as well, and we formed what you probably all know of as Parents Action Group which is unfortunately not disbanded but we are no longer a formal group anymore, to try and do something about it from a parents perspective. We were invited by Education to sit in on several meetings which included J.E.Y.A. (Jersey Early Years Association) and Jersey Child Care Trust, Ben Fox, Mike Vibert , which was extremely helpful because I think their perspective of what we were asking for and what we were asking for initially were 2 completely different things. I do wonder if there are still a lot of States Members who still have the view, and I have read it in the press and I have heard it said, that nobody is asking for the taxpayer to care for the care of their children. That has never been what has been asked for. We have an inequitable system in that there are children who are allowed free nursery education which includes at that age an element of care, obviously, and there are those who do not and it is simply not fair. Nobody was ever asking for full- time places to be paid for as in working parents full-time hours, it was simply that all children on the

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can you go back to what you mentioned earlier, about meetings with the Minister and with Deputy Fox. What was discussed at those meetings?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It was really at the very beginning of trying to establish what the private sector, the Jersey Child Care Trust, parents and practitioners felt would be the best way to move forward to try and find a solution. So from our perspective, from a parent's perspective, it was explaining to them and Yasmine was there as well, Yasmine Thebault, it was really to explain from a parent's perspective how as a working parent trying to find the best place for your child to be, for them to get the most out of nursery and from an educational aspect to progress them and to prepare them for school and to fit in with your family unit and your life and your needs, because unfortunately most parents on the Island, both parents have to work. It is a financial necessity. I am in a very lucky position in that I have chosen, to a certain extent, to work and I now have to work because we have bought a house, having done our 18 years to get our qualifications. But it was really an open forum for everybody to give their views and it was also discussed with J.E.Y.A. and with J.C.C.T. (Jersey Child Care Trust) how they would go about ensuring that the standards in private day care were the same as a States nursery class, and there is inequity the other way around as well. States nursery classes have different ratios. Private nurseries, I think on the first aid training all private day care nursery workers have to be first aid qualified whereas in the States nursery class it is included within the school, so the cost of that sort of training, and so it was really an open forum discussion for everybody to put their views forward, and it was extremely helpful and I know Mike Vibert and Ben Fox and Yasmine as well realised that it was possible to be able to move this out into the private sector. It would take a lot of work, it would take a lot of organisation, it would take a lot of vetting and monitoring but it would be possible. It is done in the U.K. very successfully.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can I just pick up on a few points, please, before I forget them? It was a round the table meeting so you were there with J.E.Y.A. and J.C.C.T. at the same time?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: Yes.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : One meeting or more?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: I attended 2.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

When did they take place?  2 years ago, 3 years ago?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It would have been I think at least 2 and a half years ago, very early on. I think it was from that that Mike Vibert and Ben Fox had moved on and moved forward and then I think there were discussions particularly with the J.C.C.T. A group was formed to then move forward to try and put the proposal together which we were not involved in.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

You have just said the Minister, Senator Vibert , thought he could move it into the private sector. What was "it"? What was the idea that you all sat down and discussed?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

The idea that there would be an equal provision of private or States nursery education that would then be available to all 3 and 4 year-olds on the Island.  Not just within a school nursery class setting.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Was funding discussed at that stage?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It was discussed and nobody had the ideal answer. At the moment there are a lot of parents who pay their tax which is funding the States nursery classes and then they are also paying for private nursery education, so in effect they are paying twice. I am no longer one of them but there is one sitting next to me. There is not an ideal answer. Parents Action Group did a presentation to E.D.C. (Economic Development Committee) long before that. Probably 3 years ago. Basically moving the point forward that it should not just be a matter for the Education Department to find the funding. It is something that will impact on every single States department, every single States department. If women find it easier to go back to work because their children are in an environment where they are cared for, where they are allowed to feel, to be perfectly frank, not guilty for going back to work, which a lot of us are, their children are somewhere safe, they are cared for, they are also being prepared for school in the same environment. They are not being moved from one place to the next place, to granny's, to be picked up, to then come home for their tea. They are somewhere where it is all under one roof. A lot of women would go back to work, they would also ... I mean you will know far better than I but I have read some of the surveys, continuity of care, pre-school nursery education through play, through however it is supposed to be done, and I am not a qualified practitioner, has an impact longer term on all sorts of social levels, and we were trying to get across to them that it should not be left at the door of education to foot the bill. It should be a Ministerial decision and it should be budgeted from the whole States' budget.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can I just stop you there, please, Mrs. McKenzie? You mentioned this presentation to E.D.C. Do you have a record of that?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I can get a copy of it for you if you would like to see it.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : We would indeed like to see it.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It was a PowerPoint presentation so I can get a copy.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

That would be very helpful. Can you just tell us who was present? It was the committee at the time?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It was 3 members of the Parents Action Group. We were invited to give a presentation to E.D.C. We showed part of the presentation at a meeting we had at the town hall, an open public meeting we had at the town hall when we very first started trying to get some support to move this issue forward. It was a meeting, an evening meeting at the town hall and I think there was a rates meeting the next day, so we walked in and the entire hall upstairs was full of chairs, and we thought: "This is going to look horrendous if 50 people turn up" and it was standing room only, and that is when we realised that there was a huge amount of support. I mean we had a very quick head count but they reckoned there were over 270 parents there that evening.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

When you gave the presentation to the committee which committee members were there? Do you remember?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I was not at the meeting and I do not recall off the top of my head, but there will be a record, so I will be able to advise you who did attend the presentation.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I think Deputy Pitman wants to come in with some questions there.

Deputy S. Pitman of St. Helier :

You spoke of your meetings early on with E.S.C. (Education, Sport and Culture). I just wanted to know how you feel E.S.C. and the other relevant departments have progressed, firstly with an overall strategy 0 to 5 years, and what you think of the recent proposal that was taken to the States for the 3 and 4 year- olds?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Before we do that, can we come back to that, because I think that is leading on to somewhere else. To look at it, whereas Laurie has had a history of doing and preparing the background of this, I am coming in quite new, but I would just like to give you some facts, first of all, because I think the facts then will lead on to business acumen as to where, how and what we move this proposition forward and also the fact that your very question is what do we think about the 3 to 4 year-olds? I think you may know what we think about it because that is why we are here going forward, but I have been doing some business figures and pulled out things from papers, articles and cuttings. I think perhaps if we just get a few facts and figures in a table that would maybe just put into perspective what we are talking about. Sorry to interrupt. Firstly, I am a mother who has a child at nursery. I pay £865 a month for a full-time place at a private nursery for a 2 year-old. My first child went there from the age of ... I went back to work with child one at 4 months, child 2 at 6 months. For the first year to 14 months they both had a child minder and a nanny. I then moved them at around about the age of 17 or 18 months into nursery, so I have had a child minder, because it is not called child minder anymore, so I am not allowed to say that any more, I have had a nanny, and I have used the nursery. The nursery both at a younger age I felt was the right thing to do. Some people cannot do that and we should look at hourly rates and figures of what we are talking about here. 6 years ago I paid my child minder £4.50 an hour. Now at that point I was like: "Oh, my cleaner got paid more than that". I mean that is how disgraceful we are talking. We are talking base salaries here. My nanny this time around was in fact my sister but she had just qualified as a nanny and I was paying her £7.50 an hour which is fairly low. I mean I should have been really paying about £10 but she was straight out of college and so it was giving her the experience that she needed. So we are moving up. No tax relief on nannies. Disgraceful. Okay? Because you can pay for a child minder and you get tax relief, you can put them in a holiday camp and you get tax relief, and you put them into nursery and you get tax relief. But because you have the ability to be able to have somebody in your own home who can look after a child in that environment, flexible for yourself, you do not get tax relief. Point 2. So at point 3 we go to nursery, we now pay, as I say, £865. That is one of the lower paid nurseries, child care nurseries, that is Nestings Nurseries. If you get the rates for La Petit Ecole you would find that that would be even higher, that is over £1,000 a month for child care. So let us look at that in the equivalent of a business perspective. For 15 years I have worked in the trust industry in finance, so I have for the last ... well, since the children have been born I was working as a director so I was on good money and I could afford to pay for my child to be in full-time education, which going back on Laurie's side is exactly all I needed. You know, when you have reached director level or senior manager level for any finance industry they will not employ you part-time. It is just a no go. Firstly from an employer's perspective, and I have been there, it is not good because you need continuity, you need client relationships et cetera, et cetera, and they will not ... you just have to have full-time players. So there goes my one option on the States nurseries. It is not going to happen. For colleagues of mine who are in the same position, some of whom were bookkeepers, nail technicians, beauty ... masseurs, whatever, their lower rate of pay, it would not have enabled them to come back into the industry because of what we are charging for nursery places. They could not afford the child minder route or the nanny route, so they had to get a place at nursery, but it just was not worth their doing for 9.00 a.m. to 2.00 p.m., if we go back on Laurie's hours. Let me tell you, private or not private nursery if you are late, because you are late, over that 2.00 p.m. situation, they will charge you and it is in all their policies, terms and conditions. You cannot blame them. It is a business. So you are stuck. I too started back at work from 9.00 a.m. to 3.00 p.m. as a senior manager but of course what was 9.00 a.m. to 3.00 p.m.? I was having to pay full-time rate, so inevitably, albeit that I may have wanted to go back and pick up my baby at the time, there was no point because financially I was going to get significantly more to stay on, and not only are we talking salary, you are talking bonuses, you are talking profit share. Let me tell you, some of the very big organisations and I know because I have been there, pro rata your bonus on the hours that you work. Absolutely. The other thing is that you need to know about working mothers and it should be noted and particularly for one States member who seems to think that we like facials and play tennis which is why we send our children to nursery, quote unquote, is the fact that at the end of the day I used to go back, I used to put my children to bed, and then go back to work. So I used to put them to bed at 8.00 p.m. and then go back to work and work until 1.00 a.m. or 2.00 a.m. My husband also is the same. He is in the finance industry, he is a director of a trust company and we used to just take it in turns as to who worked, but that is not seen, you see. People do not see that. The employer, one of my employers, condemned me for that. He said it did not look good for the clients to see that we were responding at that time of the morning, albeit that we were on the same time span as the B.V.I. (British Virgin Islands) or Panama at that time. In fact, Florida in that case. I was absolutely horrified at this. I was a director. I said: "What is it that you want? Do you want work? You know, I have nursery care, I

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It is also because of the loss of the 3 to 4 year-olds. Because of the staff ratios in any nursery business the 3 to 4 year-olds subsidise the cost of the 0 to 3 year-olds and you lose your 3 to 4 year-olds and you cannot cover your costs for the 0 to 3 year-olds without putting your prices up and the minute you try and do that people cannot afford to pay those prices because it is not worth going back to work. It does not matter, you can legislate all you like but the fact is on this Island in particular and I cannot speak about anywhere else because most of my working life has been here, it does not matter if you are doing exactly the same job as the man sitting next to you, you do not get paid the same. If you work part-time you are even more marginalised. You cannot possibly be, and I have had quoted to me before: "Well, when you come back to work full-time you will be promoted". Somebody made the mistake of writing that on my annual review and I said to him: "You might want to consider rewording that before I sign it, because once I have signed it there are going to be a few problems", but that is the attitude you are dealing with. So you make a choice, if you work part-time, to not become a director, or not become a manager and that is a conscious choice you have to make and you are marginalised for it, and because of that and this whole thing with trying to find the best care for your child and mix your responsibilities as a parent and also your responsibilities to yourself. If you have had a career, I came to having a family very late, I was 36 when I had my first, and I had always worked. So for me my career was a big part of my life but the point, digressing, the point was that you lose the 3 to 4 year-olds and the cost for private nurseries for 0 to 3 year-olds is horrendous, which was another point which we were trying to make to Senator Vibert and Senator Fox when we had the open forum discussion that this whole thing impacts on not just 3 to 4 year-olds. It impacts on every person on this Island who has a child of pre-school age and also school age, because to prepare those children, and I have seen when my daughter went to school, children who have never attended a nursery being peeled physically off their mothers to be left.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can I just ask Senator Gallichan to come in, please?

Deputy J. Gallichan of St. Mary :

I was just extremely interested. Obviously I understand the economic point of view exactly. Do you happen to remember what the reaction was of the Minister when you reminded him about the impact of

removing the 3 to 4 year-olds?  Was that something he was consciously aware of?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

At the time?  No, I do not honestly think so.  No.

The Deputy of St. Mary :

This was after the change in policy had happened?  Was this ...?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

No, this was when we were having our round table discussions and that is why I think it was extremely useful because I think from Education's point of view their perspective of what we were campaigning for and what we were campaigning for were 2 completely different things.

The Deputy of St. Mary :

I was going to ask you about that earlier.  I notice that you mentioned that there were 2 different cabinets completely.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It was very much them and us at first.

The Deputy of St. Mary : Yes.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

But the more we talked and the more we discussed the more it sort of came out that we were not looking for people to pay for our child care.

The Deputy of St. Mary :

Did you feel generally at those meetings that the information you were giving, the points you were putting across, were being noted and responded to?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes. Especially Yasmine Thebault and Senator Vibert and Senator Fox were ... and I am sorry, I have forgotten his name now, the gentleman who works with Yasmine Thebault?

The Deputy of St. Mary : Mario Lundy?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Mario as well. It was quite astounding because as parents we were sitting there thinking: "I do not know how many times we have put this in writing and we have submitted it and we have sent emails. Has nobody read any of this stuff? Because you seem to be sitting at us looking at us like this is all new information but we have said it and said it and said it."

The Deputy of St. Mary :

That was the impression I wanted to get, whether that was ... that was information I wanted to get. So that was definitely your impression?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes, it was, but it was like literally sort of shutters coming up and: "Oh, yes, oh right, yes we do understand what you are asking for" and it is not the world, it is simply equity for all the children on the Island and what happens to 3 and 4 year-olds impacts on 0 to 3 year-olds.

The Deputy of St. Mary :

Absolutely. So you must have felt quite encouraged by thinking the information has gone across? That was 2 and a half years ago.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: Very encouraged.

The Deputy of St. Mary : How do you feel about it now?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: Extremely disappointed.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Why did discussions stop?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Because it moved forward then.  They issued their paper and then a group was put together.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Do you know the name of that paper?  Do you remember it?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I do.  It will come to me.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : It may come back to you.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Senator Vibert presented it to the States. It was the initial working document that they presented to the States and it was after ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Was it Investing in our Future?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes.  No, it was after that.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : That was 2005.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

No, it was after that. It was basically the proposal for the legislation that he put forward. The working document that he put to the States.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

We have something called Early Childhood Education and Care. That was a report to the Council of Ministers.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes, and after that they put a working group together.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Yes, that is right.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes, it was that. Which at that time Parents Action Group were not represented but J.E.Y.A. was and the J.C.C.T. was so we felt that both the private sector and the J.C.C.T. were there to speak on our behalf, so we had discussions with both the J.C.C.T. and J.E.Y.A. before and after the meetings that they had with Education.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

So you were not represented on that working group as ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

No, we were not.  We did ask to be, but we were not.  But we ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

So why were you not?  You asked to be.  Were you turned down politely?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Politely, yes, but I think they felt that they had reached the stage where they were trying to discuss implementation and putting a structure in place to move it forward and at the J.C.C.T. because they carry out ... they are obviously there to review and to monitor the sector and J.E.Y.A. representing the private sector and obviously education there to represent themselves as a working forum to try and put together some form of structure and a proposal that they would take to the States.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Do you want to come in there, Mrs. Roscouet?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I am quite interested, because I have not heard the history of all of this, whereas I have come in at the nuance here and I have spoken to Mike Vibert , Ben Fox and Frank Walker all of who had bothered to come to the Royal Square on our petition the other week. It is quite interesting that certain States Members had decided to use the side door, for want of a better phrase, and not come through the main square and I just think these people, and standing on my soap box here, who state that they are representing the people, whether they are for or against it and that is a person's choice and I do not take that away from any person, but to not come through and look at the nurseries that have come down there and the parents who had bothered to turn up I think is disgraceful. Because basically what they are doing is closing themselves up, shutting the door because they think they have made their mind up and that became very apparent at my latest attempt, after that, of attending the Chambers States sitting where I had put forward my question on to: "So now you have denied the proposal for child care, what is your intention now?" and I wished for all panels to speak, because I knew and I have in my little hand here, the States Members who had voted against it. All 4 of them who were sitting up there, who were Senator Le Sueur , Frank Walker , Alan MacLean and Guy de Faye, what their reasonings were. Because at that point, and you can start to work out, if they have a good reason and perhaps I am looking at the solution which is sort of going back to your question, if you have a solution, and that is what I have been taught in business, then that is half way there. Because you can look at what has happened before, you can look at the reasons why it should happen. Because I think that anybody sitting around here knows why it should be in place. We have the educational side of it, just to remember what Laurie was saying. Integration. The big thing of how many parents have to keep their children ... well, not have to keep their children, want to keep their children with them, but the time of school, at 4 they have to go. So whether it is 3, whether it is 4, it is the integrating, getting ready, so it makes it so less painful. I saw that with my first child. He was very shy and he did that. But let us look at possible solutions as to why.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Before we go on to possible solutions, could you tell us what the responses were to your question?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

On the Chamber? Yes. We went through ... Frank Walker had made, because I had spoken to him previously, absolutely no holds that he had supported our proposition 110 per cent. What he could not support was Mike Vibert 's proposition of going forward saying, and I heard them discuss this and I was their witness to this, I did hear this, was: "How are you going to get the money to fund this?" So I said ... and this was in the Royal Square, I said to him: "Well, how much are we talking about?" "I do not do the financials, Laurie has done all that previously, £3 to £4 million a year". So I said: "How are you going to get that?" and he said: "Well, we will just get the money". Mike Vibert . So Frank Walker said: "Well, how?" Because his proposition did not give a solution, it just said: "This is what we want to do". This was what was all wrong with the proposition and anybody who is a parent ... oh no, head in hand, you know, you do not have to have a huge business acumen to know that to put forward this kind of proposition it is going to get blasted. So of course he said: "Are you going to have to raise taxes? Because the only way we can do it is increasing the bottom line which means raising taxes." Mike Vibert : "So be it." Frank Walker : "Are you going to go out there and tell the public we are going to raise taxes to pay for child care?" Mike Vibert : "Yes, if need be." I am sitting there going: "Oh no, oh no, this is going forward to the States this morning, we are all going down the wrong road before we have even started", so that was the first thing. So what then happened was that Ben Fox had been there, he had also given my support in emails and he had said to me, in fact Frank Walker had suggested one of the things we could do was to reduce the overseas aid budget. Now I spoke to Colin Powell about this and I know there are very differing thoughts on this but I bring together an article which was a big advert in J.P. which they tried to make it a case, in fact I will reverse the case and we will talk about that. The fact that obviously what then happened was that Mike Vibert and Ben Fox could not, even if they wanted to, have voted for that proposition because they are on the Fair Trade Committee or whatever that is, so it would have been going against the policies that have been on that committee. So what would have been the argument would have been ... what would the argument have been if we had reduced the overseas aid budget? Well, according to this advertising material that had been paid for privately by Island residents, interesting, that it says that Frank Walker had offered to cut £3.5 million from the overseas aid over 3 years. Now there are obviously other projects going that we know, but obviously I would like to say that I would have known that one of those would have been funding. £3.5 million could save the lives of 1,300 children. So if in the world every single day 30,000 children die of extreme poverty, that is fine. Let us reverse that. We are talking about overseas aid and I am not saying that ... we are not cutting overseas aid. We cannot even ... we have not even spent the overseas aid budget. We have not even got rid of the money that we have there. So why increase it? Instead of looking at children overseas, why not look at the children of your local Island? Early this year we have this huge surge of people emigrating to Australia and New Zealand. Why? Think of it long-term. Because they cannot afford to live here. Because they cannot afford to work here, because they cannot afford work and child care. But we cannot afford the £3.5 million to try and assist providing a better work force, a more, dare I say it, organised work force of women and trust me, in administration and I would like to have this factually but I do not, I would say that the majority of organisations in trust work personally that is finance as a whole are women. I know, I can have a database of women, I can go to any ... I can go to any maternity and say: "Right, anybody on maternity want to come back and work?" I can give them flexible working hours to do reviews or whatever, they are happy to do it. So this advert could have been absolutely turned around and said: "Yes, that is absolutely fine", but what about the children of Jersey? What about doing something for them and making sure that their stable base years, of which I have heard Cathy speak at Nestings about how important and fundamental that foundation stage is at that age to base them up for private education or for States education. I mean we look at prices again. My oldest goes to FCJ, so he is in first year, and FCJ is one of the lowest priced schools in the Island and that is at around about £280 a month. I pay £865 a month for nursery and £280 for full- time qualified education. Imbalance. I am not saying it is right or wrong but imbalance ... and we know that as they go up through school we can tell you the fees are going up further and you are going to ... if you are going to private and I am not even going down that road with argument, but as you say it is being given the choice. Sorry, to go back to the original question of the sitting, so Frank Walker had already told me that he was in support, so he did offer the reasons and he said again the reasons why he had not voted for it was because it did not present a solution. Senator Le Sueur , I think he mumbled his way through the response. I do not recall what the response was, but I do not think I should go down that either. I think it was something to the effect ... I will not ... in fact it was a nothing situation. It was no argument.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Was it a political response?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Yes, it was. I think it was a: "No comment and I will just sit on the fence and get burnt while this happens", quote unquote. But I think Mr. de Faye's response which was unfortunate because Ben Carey (?) who was at the J.P. did not happen to report this part of the response, which was very unfortunate, because he did say that Trudi Roscouet had split the panel in her question on child care: "... and when asked by Mr. de Faye what was the reason, why did you feel you had to?" And he said: "Why should I pay for children to be dropped off at St. George's and St. Michael's while their mothers go and play tennis and have facials?" Now at this point, apart from going red from here right up and straight back and being egged on by the audience of which was 97 per cent male, there were probably about 3 of us as women there, so it was not even a male/female theme ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : They are fathers.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Absolutely. They are saying: "Go Trudi, go Trudi, go forward" and I felt it was only my rightful duty to say to him: "Perhaps you might want to look at that argument again" and point out a few factors to him. One, that I think you will find that St. George's and St. Michael's are primary schools, so he may find that they have their first year of education being younger, but the majority would be 3 and a half, 4 years old before they attended, so we are not talking about that. Secondly ... and we are talking about private nurseries as well. Secondly the fact is that much as I would love to have facials and go and play tennis on a weekly basis, unfortunately most of us you will find happen to be working mothers, and pointed out a few facts to him about that. About how long it takes to wait for a private nursery place again, which we have not put here. I had Luke's name down at birth, in fact pre-birth. Obviously with Dominic being there but I had to wait 2 years and even when my nanny decided to leave and the connections I had with Nestings, I still could not get him in and we have another sub-pressure there is that other mothers who are desperate ... who cannot, who need to go back to work, who are financially qualified people who desperately need to go back to work cannot get their children into the private nurseries because of the very thing that there is not enough availability at all. Thirdly, and by this time he was just staring at me at this point and I was off on my soapbox I said to him ... what worried me is that States members are sitting there giving out views like this and the reasons why we have so many againsts with absolute trash responses on subjects they know nothing about. I would not profess to stand up in the States and talk about something I knew nothing about, funnily enough like waste which was quite an amusing comment afterwards. But however he was quite prepared to stand there and say that in a ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Public forum.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Absolutely. Now whether he said it in a dry sense of humour, nobody really laughed. Well, they did, they laughed at him, and people went away ... and people have come back to me and bothered to email me that I did not know ... because I went there not knowing anybody because it was my first Chamber event, bothering to respond and saying: "You keep going with it. My goodness, you packed a punch" was yesterday's response. So that is great and I am glad that we start to ... maybe we needed to do that. We showed some of their true colours to see what they are. Alan MacLean came up with a very good argument and he was ... I think could be ... I think with a bit more information would have been able to make a more intelligent assessment, and I do not mean to say that his assessment was not intelligent, but the fact was that he has a very good business head and he would not have said anything that was derogatory but based on the facts that he had been given and I think this goes back and certainly now I am beginning to understand the history of this which of course I had not realised that this has been ongoing for many, many, many years and the fact is, and I pick up Laurie's point and personally know this by my company now, people do not read emails. They think they do, but everybody is too busy to start looking and printing it off. In the reading pile: "I will put that there to read at some point." What you have just said is I came there to make that presentation and they all looked at me and went: "This one is speaking some sense. She is bombarding us with information. My god, perhaps we need to read this", and this is now where we are with the States. The problem is Mike Vibert went forward and launched a half-cocked proposition. So we are now on the back foot again with trying to piece together what we should do.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

This is where we have said from day one to the E.S.C. it is not simply Education that should be involved in this matter. It is not simply something that should come out of their budget. It will impact Island- wide. It has to come out of the States budget. Because there will be savings in every single States department as time goes on. They may be very difficult to quantify initially but there will be long-term savings for every single States department and there will be an increase in revenue to other States departments. Tax. More women go back to work, you have more tax revenue. You have more tax dollar. What really, really upset me was a week after standing there ... well no, it was several weeks after, to be fair, standing there saying: "Oh well, we will have to cut overseas aid to fund this" which is a hugely emotive thing to do and is emotional blackmail, as far as I am concerned, and should never have been allowed into the public forum or the States debate at all, we find £38 million budget surplus. In any business anywhere in the world if you just found £38 million there might be a few questions asked as to where it came from and how amazingly over a whole 12 months we did not see it coming.

Mrs. T. Roscouet: It is very odd, that.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

That we did not have, and the budget was £1.5 million: "We did not have £1.5 million but we found £38 million but we are going to have to cut overseas aid to pay for it."

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

"But we are still going to put up G.S.T."

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

This is what really I have to say, and why I am the only one sitting here from Parents Action Group still, it is so demoralising. It is like groundhog day. You get up, you say the same thing over and over and over again and nobody listens. They all go off and they come back and they go: "Oh, yes, goldfish, oh, that is a nice castle, swim over there. Oh, that is a nice castle" and you are sitting there thinking ...

The Deputy of St. Mary : It is all being recorded here.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: It is common sense.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I would like to come in there, Mrs. McKenzie, to wave a document at you, if I can find it, which is headed: "Jersey Early Years Timeline", and it is to show you in reference to your comment on groundhog day that we have the evidence here to support your assertion.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

When was that submitted?

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : This is what we have compiled.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I would like to know, and you may have the figures, how much the States have spent on research and reports and committees to come to the conclusion that every parent on this Island has come to from the minute they have tried to go back to work and find a nursery place for their child? I know it is going to come to more than the funding required to pay for what parents are asking for.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I hope you will be pleased to know that it is a question that we have given consideration to. You are not the only ones who want to know how much it has cost.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I think just as a footnote to the discussions that I have had is that I did not speak to Senator before he left

the sitting with the Chamber and he came to me and he said: "This has not been dropped" and I said: "But how is this going to be raised again?" Little did I know at this point about this Scrutiny Panel; obviously I did not know what was happening in the background. But as far as the public is concerned, and I go back to maternity legislation, how do we know what is going on? In fact, coincidentally yesterday our Scrutiny booklet came through the door: "Oh, this is how this works. This is what this is." Now, I am hoping that other people may look at that when they look at the pictures.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I went up and read all of the contributions to the Scrutiny website and I have to say I was - I should not say surprised but I was - extremely pleased to read the comments of so many head teachers on this Island supporting everything that we have said. I do not purport to be qualified and the point Trudie made is we have people making decisions about our children's future who are not qualified to do so, who have not taken the time to research, understand and digest all of this information that we have paid for and it gets shelved; it gets filed and put away. I have read them all. I did not understand all of it but I do not have to understand all of it. I am not making decisions about the future of this Island and that is what we are talking about. We are talking about a decision that will impact on the future of this Island because if you do not invest in the children now you are not going to have an industry, a Jersey.co, left. It is so frustrating.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

You are absolutely right. I would be very interested to know of the people that voted against this proposition as to why and I would bet a bottom dollar - and it may not be everything - that in fact it would be for financial reasons. Of course, now we are sitting here with the added £38 million which has come in before we knew that this was going to happen today. I would be very interested now if I went back and did the proposal now what would the vote be?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

But the £38 million is spent already. It is gone.

Mrs. T. Roscouet: Supposedly; allegedly.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I do very much feel that the States in particular ... whenever there is a piece of legislation put to the States and there are for votes and against votes I think there should be, as a matter of public record, a reason posted on a website as to why a States Member voted for or why they voted against.

The Deputy of St. Mary :

If they have taken a chance to speak, you will have that.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

But if they do not speak and just vote, we do not know. I have no idea why half of those people voted against at all.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Yes, you can say: "Interestingly enough, all females voted for and all males voted against." That may be a very wide assumption to make.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I would just like to comment on the debate itself. Deputy Gallichan was out of the Island. Deputy Pitman may have been ill and I declared an interest because we were not going to take part in that debate because we would ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Because you knew this was happening.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Here again the media - a great tool, are they not, to inform the public or not as the case may be - did not put who had abstained and who was out of the Island so you have only got the names that you have here, another point of contention.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can I come back to some questions we have picked up on. I would just like to say it is a pleasure to hear you expressing these views because you obviously really want to get them out into the public.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

You picked the wrong people if you thought you were going to get quiet responses.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

In fact, I think we have picked the right people. Just a few questions in no particular order. What would you like to see happen now?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I would like the States as a whole to look at what they have paid for, read what they have paid for and understand that you cannot sit this in one department and make them financially responsible for it. Senator Vibert 's proposal may not have been perfect but it was a huge step in the right direction. They need to decide where they want to be in 20 years time and they need to put steps in place to move forward as to how they are going to get there. An improvement is better than sitting and doing nothing. The email I sent to all the States Members said that this was an investment not only in our children but in the future of the Island, to please vote with their conscience and their hearts and not their back pocket. I am afraid, I think, a vast majority of them voted with their back pocket. We all understand it is going to cost money. I have a bit of a problem with the way States budgets are allocated because if you do not spend what you are allocated your budget is cut the next year so it is spent. Well, it goes into the pool, does it not?

The Deputy of St. Mary :

I think there has been a sea change with the Public Finances Law on how that will work.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I may be wrong but there is a perception that budgets are spent because they are there to be spent not because they need to necessarily be spent.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I think that is the old style. Can I bring Mrs. Roscouet in there, please, just to ask what you would like to see happen now?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I would like to see the States come forward and this proposition be raised again and discussed with full detail given. I have just reminded myself, one of the arguments that was used at the previous vote ... about Deputy Gorst saying that it was a postcode lottery as to who got free nursery places. In fact, we have gone down the wrong road because we are not asking for all to go to States nurseries because we know that is not what we are talking about here. We are talking about being given the ability to provide free 20 hours. This is what we are talking about. For us, will it make much difference? We have not discussed today about means testing.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : I do have a question on that.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

From a personal point of view, and I am probably going to shoot myself in the foot, I do believe that free education should be given for all 3 to 4 year-olds but with a caveat. This may go against what Laurie is going to say; I feel it might do. From a personal perspective why should a husband and wife who are both working and both bringing in a joint salary of, say, £100,000 for example, be given a free place and therefore make a dent in the States pocket when by means testing it could be provided ... I am not saying you should not be given the option because I think it should be open to all people, but that would encourage more children into that 3 to 4 year-old nursery gap that possibly would not have the ability to go at all. However, you are then going to run into a problem because if we have children that are sitting at home and we say: "We are going to give you free 20 hours for you to go back to work and do whatever you have to do" that is great but the nurseries are absolutely bursting. There is absolutely nothing that can be done. They cannot do it because they cannot get the staff because the staff do not want to come into nursery education because they are getting paid something like £5 per hour when they know they can go to the bank and get paid £12 per hour, and that is being kind. You have an ongoing problem; we are going to need more nurseries. We are going to need to encourage more people to go into the nursery industry, into the childcare industry. This postcode lottery was the wrong argument to take and, of course, then it got into a bit of a match here: "Whose department has caused these problems? I believe it is the Education Department" or: "How did that figure?" Do you know what I mean? I think the proposition that comes back to the States has got to be: "We are not letting this go." Frank Walker has told me that he will be giving that support to me. He just wants to know where we are going to get the money from. Somebody come up with some definitive business solution as to where we are going to get the funding from and work from there. We could say that is not our problem. However, I do believe it is our problem and especially with you sitting here now, you must find a solution; you have to find a solution otherwise it will be thrown out of the States again.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can I just say we are not here necessarily to find a solution to a problem that was not of our making? We are here to look at all the evidence that perhaps led to the problem and we will have findings and recommendations.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Recommendations and proposals, yes. That is the thing, to give them some feedback. Certainly, I would like it to come back to the States to be discussed more fully.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

The Minister has said that he welcomes the review, as I am sure he does, and he is looking forward to following up on what we find.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Again, from what my personal feedback from him was, I think he is looking for something that he can bring it back and work on that.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I am sure the other Panel Members have questions for you and I am aware that we have another hearing

in an hour's time and you may want to stay for that. At 2.30 p.m. we are interviewing the Minister and Mario Lundy. It is a public hearing. What I would like to ask you, to go back to the amendments that the Minister took to the Business Plan debate, is what is your understanding of what the amendment was? What was he proposing? He was asking for £1.5 million. Are you clear on what he intended to do had he got that money?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

My understanding is that the idea was that they would provide 20 hours. It is not free; it is free if you attend a States nursery class. The funding would be given towards whatever hourly rate you pay at whatever nursery you choose to send your child to at the same level as the States. So, say it cost £4.50 per child in a States nursery place, for 20 hours out of your 38 or however many hours your child attends nursery, £4.50 would be subsidised to your hourly rate. If you paid £6 then you continue to pay the difference between £4.50 and £6 and for any hours before the 20 hours or over the 20 hours and obviously for the holidays.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

So you were quite clear that the intention was what we could describe as a public/private partnership?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: Yes.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I was not under that comprehension but that is possibly because of not having spent the amount of time that Laurie has been giving to this on the historical side of it. But from Joe Public, and I know this from my own family who have gone against this, that is not the understanding. Their understanding is that it was free 20 hours spending and it does not matter whether you are in public or private. So that is more an educated view but certainly from ... and I know this because my mum came forward with her own arguments.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

It would basically be completely equitable. Whatever it was costing per head per child you would receive that in the private sector per head per child towards your day-care and nursery education costs which is completely equitable then.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I do not like saying this but I am conscious of the time. We do have some questions that we would like to address. I think you, Mrs. Roscouet, mentioned earlier about maternity and the employment law over here. We were hoping that you could tell us - I am thinking back to perhaps before you were pregnant or had your children - what were your hopes and expectations for them regarding nursery school? How far ahead were you thinking?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I had names down for both at the point of giving birth and as soon as we knew whether it was a boy ... at the time with Dominic, because obviously with number 2 it is easier because you fall into the same route as the firstborn, literally within a week of giving birth and knowing what we were going to do he was down on college, S C J - we had a few tick boxes that we wanted - and a States school as well.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

How did you know how to go about putting his name down?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Absolutely nothing.  There was no ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: A friend told me.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Who told you?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

A girlfriend came into maternity with the forms for me who was from Jersey because not being from Jersey I had no idea at all. So I am sitting in maternity and she came in and said: "Right, schools" and I said: "Pardon? What are you talking about schools?" She said: "If you do not get her name down now you will not get a place." I did have her down for St. Mary's school and the only other was J.C.G. (Jersey College for Girls Prep) and other than that I did not have them down for any other schools at all.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

What we wanted to know was what support and services you received as mums-to-be?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

No, there is no network.  There is not support.  You just have to rely on people to be able to ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I did not do ... to be fair I did not do ... I did do the antenatal classes at the hospital with my first. I did not do N.C.T. (National Childbirth Trust) with my first; I did with my second. I think had I done it with my first I probably would have got a lot more information but only because I would have been with women in the same situation who were Jersey born who may have already been through it or whose sisters or family was here and knew.  But, no, I had no idea.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Would you tell us what you would like to have had as mums-to-be to prepare you for all the avenues for your child from nought to 5?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

We have the book, the Childhood Learning book, which does come about ... I think that was ... I managed to get that on both but I do not know ... that was earlier on; from the hospital I think that was. Interestingly enough, one of the things that is an absolute minefield is the Social Security element of it, the maternity grant, because when you are in it and you are doing it that is fine but it was a nightmare trying to work out the 13 weeks: "What do you mean 13 weeks? Where do you go from?" With the first one I was a manager and financially it would have crippled me to have stopped at 13 weeks so I carried on going and carried on going. Another one is the tax department. Nobody has any answers to queries. You have to go through and find the right person to answer that. Again, you are looking at the tax element of it. How do you know what is going on with your tax? Another nightmare and a half; you stop earning. It is more straightforward now, but I do not know with tax being paid now. No, there is no information that is forthcoming. It would be great to be able to have some form of network whether it is through your doctor or whether it is through the hospital, because either one of those 2 you have got to go to, so even if you do not got to classes or whatever, they are the only 2 points I could think of that would be able to give you a pack of information and a step-by-step guide as to what to do, schools - and that is another issue and a half - nurseries, lists et cetera.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

As somebody who did not go to school here and has no ... because we knew nothing about any schools at all. To form a decision I had to go and see which ... they were sort of looking at me as if you say: "What do you mean you want to come and see us before you put her name down?" I said: "Well, how do I know if I am going to like your school and I want my child to be there?" It is the assumption that: "You are very lucky to get a place so what do you mean you want to come and inspect us" type of thing. I had absolutely no idea at all about FCJ, Beaulieu, I stupidly, being a non-Catholic Beaulieu for information and was quietly informed that there would be absolutely no chance that my daughter would get a place, very nicely, very politely. I had no idea at all, none at all, and it was friends ...

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

You have got the same thing as what has happened ... it was very interesting because there were 4 of us that gave birth all within 4 days of each other and we all got together because 2 of those were non-locals and we said: "Right, you have got to do schools." We had 3 boys and one girl and we all put in towards college; we all went in for college and all the applications were submitted within a week of each other, days of each other, because we all did it at the same time. I was the only one that had a permanent place given because I am an ex-college person.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: That has changed now.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Yes, I know that they have now. Now I cannot get Luke in because I did not send Dominic there. He got a place; I chose not to do that so when Luke was born ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Not necessarily. No, they have changed it now. It used to be because when my first daughter ... I put her name down. She was seventh on the waiting list and I did not realise they had 3 lists because there was 3 terms. They split the birth dates into 3 terms so there were 3 lists and once you were on a list unless somebody dropped off your list you then moved up. I know at prep they no longer do that. Everybody sends their application forms in - and I only know because I am on the P.T.A (Parent Teachers Association) - and one of the P.T.A. members is there to help the school draw the names now and they literally choose ... all the applications, their names go into 2 hats, one boys and one girls, they draw out 66 boys names and 66 girls names. So it is no longer done on a "when your child was born" and within ...

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I think you will find that each school has ... and it is another issue and a half and this is not what we are here to talk about, but if you are talking about schools where you cannot get in communication with them i.e. St. Christopher's, who has no admin backup and support at all ... they do not answer the phone, they do not answer letters, you cannot get through to the school.  They are a great school on the prima facie of it because they are in town, they have got a lovely little after-school club which would have been fantastic but we could not get through to them at all.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I have to say my daughter went to St. Christopher's for a year and I agree with you a hundred per cent on the communication thing but we just went up and knocked on the front door. She did go for a year before she went to prep.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

That is exactly what my husband did to get forms. I know this is not why we are here but this raises another issue as to school selection and should there be ... looking at a school panel, I do not know.

That is another issue for another day.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I have just got a few more questions and I am sure Deputies Gallichan and Pitman may have some as well. Would you like to comment on the health service over here as mothers-to-be or as mums now? Have you had any ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: I would say first class.

Mrs. T. Roscouet: Yes, absolutely.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: In comparison to ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

As far as children's care is concerned?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes, and the general practitioner (G.P.) service over here is fantastic. If you phone up even if they are full they will always fit a child in. The maternity care was first class and I ended up having to sections but fantastic care; absolutely fantastic care. Compared to some of my friends in the U.K. who have been left in corridors on gurneys and out immediately - if you can walk and you can sit up then you are out at lunchtime. Fantastic care; great.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Slightly differently, although it could be health issues, do you know of any information that is available to parents who may be having difficulties with their young children at all, whether health difficulties or perhaps emotional and behavioural?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I would like to just make one comment here which concerns me, and it is interesting because I had not thought of it until today, is the health visitors. With child one - and we are talking 6 years ago - I had a one-to-one health visitor who was excellent. However, people were not so lucky - again there were 4 of us who all had babies in that week - that did not have that support but I had a very, very good ... I went through quite a turmoil family issue at the time and she was fantastic. She was offering mediation and help, and obviously a new baby: "You have got to look after this"; she stayed in contact all the time. With Luke not only did I not have a health visitor but he also broke his leg twice before he ... well, he is only 2 and a half now so he broke his leg twice last year. I got one call to say: "We have heard he has broken his leg." It was 2 accidents - please quote for the record - but there was no back-up; there were no questions raised. I happened to bump into my old health visitor while out and said: "You will not believe what has happened to me." We had a joke but I do expect one of the health visitors to obviously be in touch. It is a bit of a no-win situation for me because I did not want them to be in touch but on the other hand what does this raise? We do not know what is going on in the Island. I was in Guernsey last week and I do not know if you have read the Guernsey Post. A very big case has been raised about a child pornography/incestuous cycle which was absolutely terrifying and I do have the paper article at home if you are interested. It was literally about a child who had been abused by her father and a ring of men in Guernsey and who are there now - and it is all about the paedophile register so again I digress somewhat. But what was frightening was that these people were still in the Island and still not known. If that is what is happening in Guernsey what do we not know about what is going on in Jersey? I digress on the fact but I do not believe the health visitors, for whatever reasons and they will have their own reasons, are getting full support and I can back that up with about 5 people, particularly after babies 2 and 3.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes, I have to say I never saw a health visitor after my second child.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Were you given any reason why?

Mrs. T. Roscouet: No, they just ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : It just does not happen.

Mrs. T. Roscouet: No.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

They just do not appear. The first one, no sooner have you got home than they are ringing your doorbell and they are there, and they are there every day. I do understand priority has to be given to first time parents because you do not know what you are doing and you do not know what to expect. I had a completely different experience with my health visitor. She was more interested in coming and telling me about the problems with her boyfriend or the night she had out the night before and was of

absolutely no use to me whatsoever.  So not a great experience.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

The midwife care afterwards is brilliant. Midwives come out to you and they are the life support. It does not matter how many children you have but if there has been any kind of problems you need help and they were brilliant. They were very, very good and Luke had a few problems and ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Who would advise you about immunisations?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Your red book that you have; when you leave hospital you are given your red book and the clinics at Le Bas ... I went to the clinic at Le Bas because I was in town.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

They have it at the Parish Hall s but they even

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

St. Mary still do have clinics.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Dominic was very good 6 years ago but Luke ... I did not have any ... 2 years ago ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

So you have noticed the change in the level of service?  You both have.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I have noticed a change. My second child was not called back for her ... is it 2 years? I had to phone up and say: "I have not heard from anybody and surely she should be ...?" and then I was. But Le Bas were very good. Commenting on Trudie saying he had broken his leg twice and there was no comment, my eldest daughter cut her head open twice in a year, both times A. and E. (Accident and Emergency), and I have to say the second time my poor husband was given quite a serious grilling by A. and E. Justifiably and quite rightly questions were asked as to why she was back again. Quite disconcerting to see 6 foot man in tears. We were asked the questions but that was with my first. With my second, touch wood, less accident prone ... but that was 9 years ago. My eldest is ... it was probably 6 years ago.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

That does worry me a bit.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can I ask you to go back to the broken leg?  Presumably he went to A. and E?

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Oh, yes, both times and then we started to ask questions because obviously we went privately then because ... whether there was any bone deformity or anything, but never were any questions raised.  That is an alarm bell for what could or could not be happening out there.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Can I ask Deputy Gallichan if she has anything to ask?

The Deputy of St. Mary :

I think you have covered pretty much everything I was going to ask. You have covered it very well, I think.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I would just like to add about this doctor's support throughout both pregnancies and my own personal ... Rob Horrock(?) at Cleveland Clinic was absolutely fantastic.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I had David Frank at Cleveland Clinic.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Oh, did you?  They are very, very good.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I did chaired care with the hospital.  They were fantastic.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Before we finish then, is there anything else that you think you should tell us or could tell us, perhaps something that we ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: A dangerous question.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

How much longer have you got?

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

Well, I understand we have got about another 10 minutes. We do not have to fill that time but if something occurred ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I think, to be honest, we have ... I am very grateful for the opportunity to have been able to give you our views and for you to very patiently sit here and listen to us on our soap boxes. I just really do hope that the States Members will take notice of your summations and proposals and that this is moved forward because it really is so important that we make sure the children are looked after.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

My concern is that a lot of time and effort is being submitted for another report.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I would like to make a comment on that. This is a political report. It is being prepared by politicians. It will be submitted to politicians and the Minister is required under a draft code of practice to respond to our findings and recommendations.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

The Minister for Education?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Is that the Minister for Education or the Ministers?

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

That is the Minister for Education unless we make recommendations that impinge on the department's ...

Mrs. T. Roscouet: That does not go back.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

The problem is we know Senator Vibert wants this moved forward. Our problem is the other States Members.

The Deputy of St. Mary :

We have already identified issues involving other departments. It is something that we are already focusing ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

That we are aware of and the other thing, of course, is were we to make a recommendation - and I cannot think of an example - that the Minister chose to not follow through, we have the option of taking a proposition to the House ourselves, obviously not for funding issues but ... which is why I cannot think of an example. It is a report that comes at the end of a long line of them but we will make sure it has more clout.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

You mentioned about means testing and you said you were going ask a question.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

My question really was what are your comments on means testing because the Minister has asked us to look at it specifically as an issue.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

My understanding of how the funding will be given to the private sector, as in the same level as the public sector ... we all pay tax so every child of every parent whether they earn £100,000 or £20,000 ... if you are earning £100,000 you are paying more tax so to me you are just as entitled ... or your child is just as entitled to the same funding as a child who has a ... because there is nothing to stop me earning £100,000 and getting a place at a States nursery. I just think to means test ...

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I made a caveat to my proposal on that because my understanding of free placing was free - it is for free.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: And it is not free.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian : Because you already pay taxes?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

No, I truly did not understand that the funding was a subsidy to the cost in the private sector rather than paying for it.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I would be very interested to see the ... that probably needs to come out in some form of media response about the definition of what free really means.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

That is why free has always been free.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I am not sure that anyone quite knows what that is at the moment.  That is what we are trying to unravel.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

Oh, okay.  That is interesting, that you ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

And that is from day one, the initial discussions with Senators Vibert and Fox because their understanding at the time was that we wanted free ... you know, we did not want to pay at all and we wanted to ... and this is where the St. Georges/St. Michaels whole thing came in that: "Why should we pay for St. Michaels nursery places and St. Georges nursery places as opposed to the funding for a States nursery place?"

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

We already can see ... this has got to be a fundamental problem before we even ... I mean, absolutely ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes, and it is the whole thing with: "Where is the money coming from?"

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

People have voted ... this is where it goes back to why they voted against. If they do not even understand ... if we cannot ... and you are sitting there with the paperwork. That is interesting.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I am assuming what I understand is correct but I could be wrong.

The Deputy of St. Mary :

I think that reinforces what you have just said. Assumption of what you think is correct is often as bad as not having even read the stuff in the first place.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

From the discussions that I have had with J.E.YA., with Janice Baker and Val Payne and with the Ministers, that has always been my understanding but I could be incorrect.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

What I would just like to say about the ... you are talking about States Members who do not understand the background to the proposition. There have been a number of presentations made to the Council of Ministers so they in theory should all have been well aware of what the Minister was intending and what his strategy was. You have mentioned Senators Walker , Le Sueur and Deputy de Faye, Alan Maclean is an Assistant Minister, so you were speaking to members of the executive at the Chamber Hearing. It begs the question if they do not understand ... and also, this is political, why have these presentations to the Council of Ministers and to all States Members who have to take part in the decision.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Exactly, because all States Members are voting.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I think that should go as a view to all discussions and debates ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Because we elect all of you; we do not elect the Council of Ministers.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

What I would like to say though is this hearing had been advertised ... has the media been made aware of this hearing? So this is the response because we could have had this room full of the public, media and interested parents or even States Members.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I have to say my impression was that we were invited to submit written comments but I do not think it was made clear that if you did that then you may be invited for further discussion.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

That is something we can maybe look at.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

Yes, because as I say I did not ... they emailed me and said I have had ...

The Deputy of St. Mary :

Hopefully, the process of Scrutiny is better and hopefully the newsletters will help people to know what can be done. One of our big problems has been people do not really understand how much input they can have and also unfortunately of course, particularly in this case because most of our hearings are during the day it is not easy. We did try and look at getting some evenings in but the people that wanted

to get to this could not make those anyway.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

They were Parents Action Group members. My final question is can you tell us why the action group has folded?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

I think because all of the parents that initially started getting involved in this all had children at Avranches or West Mount. We did have quite a lot of input from some of the private day-care nurseries' owners and managers. We liaised a lot with J.E.Y.A. Unfortunately, this has gone on to the point that our children have moved out of the nursery environment and into the school environment and the parents who were actively trying to move this issue forward have now become involved in their children's school lives. Some are P.T.A. members, are on school councils, whatever else. We did try and get parents who had children just starting in at nursery to take up the mantle and keep the issue moving forward.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

We did it as well. I did it when Dominic was born. As I mentioned, I worked with the Jersey Childcare Trust and we set up a parents' support group. This is going on to another generation, as it were. In fact, what happened there was that Fiona could not really give the time to chairing it. There were quite a few strong bodies on there that all wanted to chair a meeting but, of course, there was no actual chair so in the end I said: "Look, no disrespect, I am giving up time here." I was working full-time as well as a new baby: "This is not going anywhere" because we have either got to have a nominated representative from the Childcare Trust who is going to chair it and take it forward all in one body. Basically, it then folded; I know it kept going again because I received the Childcare Trust letters but I think it is ... it is the momentum. It is always going to be one of these subjects that it is going to affect the ones that are in it now. Laurie has kept it going; obviously I am in it so that is quite helpful for me. The maternity legislation I am ... when you are going to take that back, I am up for that even though I will not be having any more children - that is for the record. As a financier and seeing what has happened and seeing people being booted out of their jobs, being asked to leave, it is disgraceful.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

When I had my first child I was the first female member of staff to ever come back to work on a negotiated maternity contract.

Mrs. T. Roscouet: Even now there is still ...

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

What I would like to say on that is that there is a proposal to carry out a Scrutiny review of proposed employment legislation - maternity, paternity, adoption and fostering. That is in the New Year and it is not by our panel. Could I just draw the meeting to a close if I may, please. Thank you both for coming to speak to us. We have not said a lot during this hearing which I think is a good sign because we are here to listen to what you have to say. I hope you feel that you have been able to express your views frankly. You get the transcripts to read - so do we - and we are bound to come up with questions that we may want to follow up. Would you mind if we followed those up?

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: Not at all.

Mrs. T. Roscouet: No, not at all.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

I think you will be hearing from us. We will probably contact you by letter first of all but it may even be that we ask you to come back and have further chats later on. We are aiming to get the report finished though, I must say, certainly in a draft format by the end of this year. I am not trying to put our officer under any pressure but it is there and hopefully to be presented to the States certainly by spring of next year. It is still ongoing, you see.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

That is a lot of the reason why a lot of other people just ...

Mrs. T. Roscouet: Give up.

Mrs. L. Mackenzie: They do give up.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I am afraid that is the problem the States have in the public domain.

Deputy D.W. Mezbourian :

The trouble is we are finding more and more as we are looking at background and speaking to people.

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

It is not just one area.  I have to say I think the general public in Jersey have, to a certain extent, given up because they feel nobody is listening and you can say it, and say it, and say it and you can go out there and you can give up the time, and you can attend meetings ... I mean, 5 years your positions in the State.  You knew what the feedback was out there and you all think you can make a difference but this is why to have made public the reasons for why people are not voting because what happens is everybody, when we do the electoral ...

Mrs. L. Mackenzie:

They all stand up and go: "We support it, we support it."

Mrs. T. Roscouet:

I particularly look for childcare as do 90 per cent of the ... who are we voting for? I will not name people because that would be very wrong of me but I know certainly that one Member of the Minister's panel has backed down on something so severe and if he is leading that then where are you going ... where do you go to, who do you go to? I am quite open with Mr. de Faye to say: "What a load of rubbish." He spoke ... and, in fact, my last comment was ... I did say: "Well, you are obviously not a father to even understand these issues." There was general laughter to which he said: "You cannot prove that." At this point I felt it best not say