Emile Collins Time4Change Jersey - anti-GST demonstration May 2008

Emile Collins (95 year old political activist) protests at restrictions on Time4Change Reform, during an anti GST demonstration in the Royal Square, St Helier, JERSEY, 06.05.2006.

Emile Collins was a fighter to the last. He organised politically against the Fascist occupation of the island, becoming an early member of the, then illegal, Jersey Democratic Movement, founded in 1944. Although the JDM did not succeed at the election of 1948, he remained involved with the labour movement during those lonely years of democratic stagnation. He worked all his life as a master carpenter and knew well the parsimony of Jersey employers. In 2005 he joined the Jersey Democratic Alliance, the beginning of a popular political awakening, dormant since the immediate post war period.

Emile courageously spoke at a demonstration on 8th March 2008 organised by Time4Change to protest against revelations of government responsibility and cover up of child abuse at the Haut de la Garenne orphanage. When the victims and their supporters finally broke the wall of silence to enter the Royal Square in protest, Emile was in the vanguard to assist their campaign. He thrilled at the opportunity to speak at the demonstration. That he should be a founder member once again of a movement for social justice was no coincidence. Time4Change was a natural progression for a lifelong democracy campaigner.

Emile can be seen in a YouTube video when he spoke on behalf of Time4Change at a demonstration in May 2008 against an unpopular new consumption tax called GST. It was introduced as part of the austerity programme designed to reduce the standard of living of working people by an island government that preferred to tax the low and middle income earners rather than its wealthy supporters. Jersey workers must pay additional taxes on bread to keep the millionaires rich or there will be no food to eat.

He died, aged 98 on 10th February 2011 of a broken heart, soon after BBC Radio Jersey closed down the weekday lunchtime phone-in programme (to prevent voices of dissent being heard in an election year), of which he had been a daily contributor. Knowing he could still contribute to the struggle for social justice, even in his nineties, by voicing his protest on the phone-in programme, fed his spirit to remain alive. The programme was abruptly terminated by bureaucratic fiat in January 2011. Within a month he was dead. The programme had become "predictable" according to secret minutes and with an election looming in nine months, the voices of dissent had to be silenced.

He survived the five years of Nazi German occupation of Jersey, but ultimately fell 67 years later, when modern government stooges prevented him speaking out for the labour movement and working people of Jersey. For a man who was prepared to accept arrest and suffering under the Nazis this was surely a cruel end.

To reach the age of 98 is unusual; to remain mentally active and engaged politically is an achievement. Freedom can never be taken for granted and it is sad that this lesson has to be learnt the hard way every time by those who should know better.

For more biography of Emile Colliins see:
http://voiceforprotest.blogspot.com
isthisjersey.com
http://mtadier.blogspot.com/

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