INTERVIEW WITH MATT YOUNG, ACTING ADMINISTRATOR

Matt Young, the Acting Administrator, talks to Stephen Fowler and Caroline Yon for The Islander.

ISLANDER: Before we start, can you give us a potted history of yourself?
MY: I live just outside Glasgow in Scotland, and for 32 years I worked in local government. After a major reorganisation in 1996 I took early retirement. I then happened to see an advert for the Financial Secretary's job in St Helena, applied for it and got it, so I ended up in St Helena in April 1996, and stayed there until June 2000. I thoroughly enjoyed my time on the island. I came back home from St Helena in mid-2000, and was fortunate enough to be retained by the St Helena Government as their Commercial Representative in the UK, and also as a Director of the St Helena line. Shortly after that I was approached by the Foreign Office to help with the change process on Ascension. So since about September of 2000, a lot of my time has been taken up in dealing with Ascension matters, which brings us up to the present. Mr. Fairhurst the current Administrator has now started his pre-retirement leave, and there is a gap before the new Administrator Mr Kettlewell gets to the island, so I am actually keeping the seat warm!

ISLANDER: Describe your role as Special Advisor to the Ascension Island Government.
MY: I was retained as what was called Senior Government Advisor; that was the title given by the Foreign Office. Up until now it has involved concentrating on financial matters, preparing the first budget in conjunction with Adam Henshaw, and also helping to draft new legislation for customs, income tax and property tax, and generally advising on the setting up of these things. The current role is obviously somewhat different in that I am here now as Ag. Administrator, so it's changed from an advisory role.

ISLANDER: Are you the sole remaining Director of Ascension Island Commercial Services?
MY: Yes I am, representing AIG as the sole share-holder, and will remain so until such time as we are able to wind the company up which I hope would be within this financial year, or certainly by the end of it.

ISLANDER: Describe your role with regard to the SHELCO initiative.
MY: SHELCO have submitted proposals regarding the airport and other developments on St Helena, and these are being considered by SHG and a team on the island. A team has also been set up in the UK to lend support and participate in discussions with DFID and SHELCO at the UK end. I am a member of that team.

ISLANDER: What role do you fulfil as regards the St Helena Line?
MY: I am a Director of the St Helena Line.

ISLANDER: Can you give us a line on the type of businesses that you foresee developing here in Ascension, and the possibility of attracting large investors here? The only ones seen so far are small local initiatives.
MY: I think certainly that it has in the main been small, but one could argue that the businesses that Obsidian has now acquired are not necessarily small in island terms.

ISLANDER: We're talking about attracting companies or investors with huge amounts of money.
MY: All I can say to that is yes, it would be nice if that could happen; it's a question of marketing the island, basically. We're at a very early stage in the development process, and I think before anybody would come in with a great deal of money for any particular investment, the fundamental issue is access, which is restricted at the moment through the RAF flights and the RMS scheduling, so if one is thinking of a large type of development then clearly better access is vital, so I think that this is the prime issue for the island just as it is on St Helena.

ISLANDER: Where do we stand on the renegotiations for the commercial use of the airport at the moment?
MY: This process is still going on; the events of the 11th of September 01 obviously diverted American minds elsewhere, so there was a bit of a hiatus, but as I understand it discussions are still going on, and as I understand it there is a further round of talks scheduled for the end of this month.

ISLANDER: We find that there is a general suspicion that the interests of the people of Ascension are always going to come 2nd within the St Helena / Ascension Island relationship, so what would you say to people who think that you, Mr Kettlewell, Mr Fairhurst or whoever happens to be in that chair, is only here to implement the wishes of an absentee Governor? Do you find that to be a fair description of the situation here?
MY: There is the issue of the constitutional relationship involving the islands of St Helena, Ascension and Tristan and the Governor is Governor of Ascension as well as the other 2 islands. That relationship will remain but with the advent of some form of democracy there will be a change to the extent that it will no longer simply be a relationship between two individuals, the Governor and the Administrator, there will be some form of elected body which will be presided over by the Governor, or in his absence the Administrator. I think that the point to emphasise is that he is the Governor of Ascension and whilst the linkage between the two islands is there in constitutional terms and I think should also remain in economic terms as well, because the two islands can help each other in lots of ways, though there is a difference between the two - I think it is a situation that will evolve after some form of democracy is in place and I think will change from what it currently is.

ISLANDER: From past comments we have an impression that St Helena tends to look at Ascension as a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and when you say about a financial relationship between the two islands it seems to be, at the moment, one way traffic i.e; Ascension is here to supplement St Helena's economy but we feel that we should be allowed to develop on our own first and get a strong and stable economy of our own and then we can help St Helena and seeking to siphon off tax money before this is achieved will help no-one in the long term.
MY: There is no question of siphoning off tax money. That is Ascension's money and stays on Ascension. What does benefit the SH economy is obviously remittances sent back to the island for their family or to build houses.

ISLANDER: We are referring specifically to the health and education departments and monies paid for 'advice'.
MY: There is an arrangement whereby if Ascension does require assistance on any specific issue it can go to St Helena to buy that expertise if required. I repeat the money which is raised through taxation on Ascension is used to finance all of the services, health, education and the Agency and stays on Ascension and part of it is designed to have a level of reserve and also for the first time to have some Capital Expenditure which is needed on the island.

ISLANDER: Can you comment on the fact that there is a feeling that all key decisions about the future of Ascension seem to be taken by people who are non-resident and are thereby insulated from the effects of policies resulting from these decisions?
MY: Clearly it's been a major change and negotiations had to take place between the Joint Venture partners and AIG. In the main these discussions did take place in London and involved FCO officials, legal representatives for all parties and myself representing AIG. I think that was necessary to do that but having done it what we then had was a situation where the structure to take over that was island based it was AIG the Administrator, the Director of Financial Services, the Director Technical Services and then the other part of it, the businesses and the company that was set up to handle what was set up on the island and so the Chief Executive (John Cavana) was appointed to see that process through. So whilst a lot of work has been done outside the island, a lot of work has been done using people who are familiar with Ascension and who have spent time here so it wasn't divorced entirely from the island.

ISLANDER: But all the people with the exception of the Director of Financial Services are not resident on the island and those that have been here to make decisions are no longer here when those decisions have been implemented.
MY: We have brought this to the stage whereby the service provision is now under AIG and in due course there will be an elected body. Former public sector businesses have now gone to the private sector and are being operated by people who are resident on the island.

ISLANDER: Why were only some businesses deemed suitable for the 'sell off' and others such as the garage and the insurance service retained by the Agency. Why did AIG not retain all of the businesses with a view to using profits to offset taxation and also to provide some control of standards?
MY: Anything which could be put into the private sector realistically, should certainly be explored with a view to doing that. It's no different from anywhere else. The trend has been for government to devolve things as far as possible to the private sector and it would certainly be the intention to encourage as many people as possible to become involved because the overall objective of AIG is to make the island somewhere which is different from what it is at the moment which is a community island where people do want to live and bring up families and have this as their home. The main work of the garage is to maintain the agency vehicles and to that extent it wasn't something, which was discreet like the shop for example. The fact is the agency still needed it and it is because there isn't a private sector garage that they are retaining it. Nothing is in tablets of stone and that is perfectly capable of being looked at in terms of the possibility of putting that in the private sector. In fact I would remind you it was said right at the outset that in creating the agency the intention was that in a 2 year period the manner in which services would be delivered would be subject to review. This is still very much on the agenda.

ISLANDER: It was you who said that it is not the business of government to run a shop, yet SHG owns 62.5% of the shares of Solomons which would imply that it is the business of government to run a shop unless it is AIG.
MY: Some years ago government had to acquire a major interest in Solomons and until 2000 they owned 85% of the shares. A policy decision was taken by SHG that it was not the business of government to own these shares. Because the market for these shares is limited it was decided that you could not have a major sell off in one go and the reduction to 62.5% is the first phase of that sell off. As part of that process the articles of association were changed which took away the right of government to interfere in the running of Solomons. What exists is that SHG have a director on the board of Solomons who is traditionally the Financial Secretary and during my tenure as Fin Sec I was a director and I was also Chairman of Solomons so I took a part in the move to begin the pull out. The important thing to realise is that whilst there is a financial stake in it there is absolutely no interference at all by government in the running of the business. You may say that there may have been clashes as I worked for government and Solomons but there weren't. As Chairman of Solomons what I was doing was following an agenda which was a change agenda for Solomons. Again a 200 year old company, things had got to the stage where they needed a shake up, we brought in a Chief Executive to lead that process for 3 years, so it was very much a process to modernise and consolidate and provide diversification of the business.

ISLANDER: Were you involved in the selection of Solomons as preferred bidder for the shop?
MY: I was involved in that as a director of AICS. The Solomons bid along with all the other bids were considered by the board, which consisted of myself, and directors from the BBC and C&W. We went through in detail all of the bids and made our decision on the strength of that examination. The criteria which was used was that in the process of selling off businesses we would like as far as possible for Saints to become involved in the businesses. We obviously had to go on the basis of the bids that came in and some came from Saints and some came from elsewhere, as you know. But it was very much looking at the viability of the business in terms of who was taking it on and the plans for the future stability of the business.

ISLANDER: You are aware that people have lost confidence in the shop and having spoken to the outgoing manager we felt that the recent problems were wholly avoidable. It appeared that most of the problems were due to human error and the business being remotely managed from 700 miles away thereby removing the management structure from being local and accountable to its customers on a daily basis.
MY: I'm not going to comment on that because it is not my role to deal with this. It is an operational matter for Solomons.

ISLANDER: Are you confident that you made the right decision as regards the shop?
MY: The decision was made properly on the basis of an assessment of the bids and indications of future developments.

ISLANDER: And because they happened to be Saints.
MY: Well yes and no. When I say preference to Saints what we were trying to do was to say you're a Saint, you live in Ascension, we would like you to have a stake in the island eg Harold Henry and the petrol station, the Obsidian Hotel has Saints in it and yes from that point of view it is still containing the shop within the St Helena involvement. The intention of Solomons, I'm quite sure, is that they have indicated that this is clearly a separate business and I would mention that part of the policy in Solomons is to look for other areas to diversify and this was one of them. So it is obviously part of the Solomons company but nevertheless is a separate entity and I think that I can't comment any further than that.

ISLANDER: Something that is constantly commented on by many people is that there would appear to be a large ratio of administrative staff to productive staff at the Agency. Is that a result of a policy to employ as many people as possible here to relieve economic pressure on St Helena.
MY: The structure of the Agency is like this because of the former structure of AIS. It is only just over a year since the Agency was created and under the TUPE arrangements obviously all of the people who were employed at that time had to be slotted into the new structure at some point. There were a number of moves to AIG but in the main AIS became AIW&SA so largely it is a historical thing. It is intended to constantly review this in terms of trying to make the agency more efficient and it will be an ongoing process.

ISLANDER: Despite the fact that there are now St Helenians world-wide it seems that Ascension is treated as a special case whereby it is responsible for propping up St Helena and at times it seems as if the FCO wants to turn the island into a mini St Helena Mark II and impose SHG systems on this island.
MY: This comes back to the situation whereby Ascension was a safety valve for St Helena. When there was little employment prospects on St Helena this was a place where people could be sent. The whole structure and the way the Saints are looking at their future is changing and is unpredictable. The future is one whereby the relationship will undoubtedly change when there is an elected body.

ISLANDER: Does the Ascension taxpayer underwrite the bill for the property tax on the Residency and the servants etc. if so what is that bill?
MY: The people that are employed at the Residency are AIG employees and are paid by government, as far as the upkeep of the Residency is concerned it is part of AIG expenditure.

ISLANDER: What are the figures involved?
MY: I don't know offhand. I will get that information for you if you want to find out. *

(*We will supply this information to The Islander as soon as it is made available to us)

Democracy Explained

Subject: DEMOCRACY explained with the aid of two cows.

FEUDALISM: You have two cows. Your lord takes some of the milk.
PURE SOCIALISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and puts them in a barn with everyone else's cows. You have to take care of all the cows. The government gives you as much milk as you need.
BUREAUCRATIC SOCIALISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and puts them in a barn with everyone else's cows. They are cared for by ex-chicken farmers. You have to take care of the chickens the government took from the chicken farmers. The government gives you as much milk and as many eggs as the regulations say you should need.
PURE COMMUNISM: You have two cows. Your neighbors help you take care of them, and you all share the milk.
RUSSIAN COMMUNISM: You have two cows. You have to take care of them, but the government takes all the milk.
DICTATORSHIP: You have two cows. The government takes both and shoots you.
SINGAPOREAN DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. The government fines you for keeping two unlicensed farm animals in an apartment.
MILITARIANISM: You have two cows. The government takes both and drafts you.
PURE DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. Your neighbors decide who gets the milk.
REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. Your neighbors pick someone to tell you who gets the milk.
AMERICAN DEMOCRACY: The government promises to give you two cows if you vote for it. After the election, the president is impeached for speculating in cow futures. The press dubs the affair "Cowgate".
BRITISH DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. You feed them sheep's' brains and they go mad. The government doesn't do anything.
ASCENSION DEMOCRACY: Two cows live on the mountain they are sacred, one is called A and the other is called B. The government takes them and denies they ever existed, Hires you to take care of them, and sells you the milk.
BUREAUCRACY: You have two cows. At first the government regulates what you can feed them and when you can milk them. Then it pays you not to milk them. After that it takes both, shoots one, milks the other and pours the milk down the drain. Then it requires you to fill out forms accounting for the missing cows.
ANARCHY: You have two cows. Either you sell the milk at a fair price or your neighbors try to kill you and take the cows.
CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull.
HONG KONG CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly - listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax deduction for keeping five cows. The milk rights of six cows are transferred via a Panamanian intermediary to a Cayman Islands company secretly owned by the majority shareholder, who sells the rights to all seven cows' milk back to the listed company. The annual report says that the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. Meanwhile, you kill the two cows because the fung shui is bad.
ENVIRONMENTALISM: You have two cows. The government bans you from milking or killing them.
FEMINISM: You have two cows. They get married and adopt a veal calf.
POLITICAL CORRECTNESS: You are associated with (the concept of "ownership" is a symbol of the phallo-centric, war-mongering, intolerant past) two differently-aged (but no less valuable to society) bovines of non-specified gender.
COUNTER CULTURE: Wow, dude, there's like...these two cows, man. You got to have some of this milk.
SURREALISM: You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.

Saturday's Beach Clean up

On Saturday over 30 people took to the beaches,
No they didn't put on tan oil to make them like peaches
Instead in their hands they had bin bags galore
To pick all the rubbish lying round on the floor

Now many would think on an island of this size
Inhabited by those who are wealthy and wise
That no one would lack the 'don't throw rubbish' cells in the brain
Or maybe they just throw these cells down the drain

The reason is not clear, the sense is not there
For why one should throw one's empty can in the air
The law of gravity dictates that it will land on the ground
And add to the trash that is lying around.

Out of the window of the car, while walking on a track
If one throws down one's litter - who will bring it back?
Who will go round behind one and humbly beseech

"please pick up thy litter off the previously lovely white beach?"

Those fine souls on Saturday gathered their bags and their gloves,
And picked up other's litter from the beaches they love.
They gathered piles and piles of the trash that had been thrown
Without a murmur, a complaint, a sigh or a groan.

And the fun that is found by working together to better the world
Is a secret that many have not yet unfurled
The barbeque at Turtle Shell beach hut added to the fun and the chat.
The day ended well, and everyone settled for that.

However this poet will not settle until the last word is said
Until the 'don't throw rubbish' cells have re-entered everyone's head
Until the island is clean and everyone's realised it's a sin
To disobey the simple rule of "throw litter in the bin"

A big thank you to everyone who helped in anyway on Saturday, and to those who have adopted beaches.

SCHOOL PAGE

From the Editors:- Marie and Sherilyn Anthony

Hello

We're back again. After our long hoilday, we're back in the Editor's new comfy chair; aswell as the new A/C to keep us cool.

A small issue this week, lots to read.

Well, that's it for this time

Happy Reading…

Sunday 07/14/2002 3:08:55am
Name: Henry A Toppin
E-Mail: Htoppin322@cox.com
Location: University of Arizona
Comments: I just wanted to say hi to everyone. I miss the "rock" and when a hotel is built I will be there to party at the club on Friday like we use to. Take care and the best of health to all.
Allan Toppin
Global HF

Sunday 07/14/2002 0:31:11am
Name: Glyn Henry
E-Mail: glynmarily@talk21.com
Location: OXFORD
Comments: HI
to all on Ascension my mum Sylvia Troy & Sharon hope to see u all some day soon GLYN MARILYN JOSH AMY TARA

Tuesday 07/16/2002 2:53:09pm
Name: Tracie Clarke-Williams
E-Mail: Billyjoe63@talk21.com
Location: North Wales
Comments: Hi to every one on Ascension Island, My friend Denise Phillps and my cousin Troy Henry, not forgetting my favourite Auntie Sylvia Henry. Hope you all are enjoying the good weather, i could do with some right now.
Good web site.
Hope to see the island again soon!
From
Tracie Clarke-Williams

Tuesday 07/16/2002 5:33:39am
Name: Gavin Lamborghini
E-Mail: Gavin1967orl@hotmail.com
Location: Orlando florida U.S.A
Comments: HI, I went to school on the rock from 79-84.I went to England for a few years, lived in St Helena and the Falklands for some years ,and then in 93-94 i worked for belfour beaty as a welder on that radar station. In 1994 I came to the U.S where i studied Architecture...I heard that an airport is been planned for St Helena, soon to be structual engineer here needs a job [hint hint]..