Jersey Democratic Alliance
Encyclopedia : J : JE : JER : Jersey Democratic Alliance
The Jersey Democratic Allianceis a centrist political party in Jersey. With the prospect of ministerial government and the creation of an executive and opposition, it formed as a political party in April 2005 at a mass rally, with the intention of fielding candidates in the elections of October and November 2005. The party was founded by Senator Ted Vibert, a returned expatriate and veteran activist in the Australian Labour Party,who drew about 1,000 people to the rally, after recruiting several States Members and numerous others.
Later in 2005 Senator Vibert announced that, on medical advice, he would not be standing for re-election on the party platform. His successor as head of the movement, Tony Keogh, was also subsequently obliged on medical advice to withdraw as a candidate and step down.
Deputy Geoff Southern was elected to the vacant chair. A few members, ostensibly fearing that the party would move too far to the left, formed the Centre Party (Jersey), supposedly remaining true to the original vision of Senator Vibert, behind their preferred figurehead of Senator Paul le Claire.
The party produced a manifesto of positive centre to mildly left-wing policies for the 2005 Senatorial Elections, but suffered severely from misrepresentation by rivals and opponents, whose taunts of "far left" and "Jersey Demolition Alliance" appeared to lodge more effectively in the public consciousness than any of the JDA's own words. More recent examples of this black propaganda can even be found by browsing the history of this page.
Chairman Deputy Geoff Southern and Secretary Denise Carroll stood for Senator, but failed to be elected by substantial margins.
Following the crushing defeats in the Senatorial Elections, the JDA followed the Centre Party in sending its candidates into the Deputies' Elections as traditional independents. Both Geoff Southern and Judy Martin retained their seats, and were joined by Shona Pitman.
On 8 May 2006, the party announced that it was reconstituting as a pressure group, with Deputy Southern resigning as chairman.However, at the subsequent General Meeting, the membership overwhelmingly voted to remain as a party. Also, in order to make a clear separation between the policy-based party and the personal supporters of its politicians, States Members were barred from the party leadership. Steve Pallett became the new Chairman.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.