See An Entire Day Wasted.

When the Brits tried to force through these LPA's they took a gamble. That gamble was that because I did not object after the solicitor informed the Office of Public Guardian I will have forfeited my right to object. What they didn't factor into this little calculation was that I was informed by the solicitor on November 26th 2009 (and can prove it) prompting me to contact the OPG on December 11th (and can prove it). This means that I had an open dialogue with the OPG from December 11th and raises the question of why they didn't independently contact me when the solicitor, who's conduct is in question, contacted them.

I have spent most of this afternoon scanning, uploading and emailing some of these documents to the OPG because if they were to look at them it would cause them to immediately fold. The trouble is that they've suddenly started having problems with their email system so while I can confirm that the documents are on their server the addressees have not received them. I would say that this means that the Brits now know that they're so far in the suck they've been forced to resort to stalling tactics in an attempt to stop this matter coming before the Court of Protection in a timely fashion. I think I'm going to have to keep a closer eye on these cunning little ninjas.

Fun as today has been and it has been quite fun I have not had the time to prepare a submission for the Haiti Donors Conference that is taking place in New York tomorrow. I will now only be able to submit a very poor skeleton argument which I will try and fill out when it is too late.

The first issue of the donors conference is that the various reconstruction agencies have only received less the 49% of the US$1.4bn they require. This is because many people who have very publicly announced donations to Haiti have so far failed to make good on those promises and provide the cash. I understand that in many cases this is the result of difficulties collecting the money from sub-donors and problems channeling the funds into appropriate projects but the conference needs to work hard to turn promises of help into actual help.

The second issue, which will also help with the first issue, is how to best make sure that the donors and people of Haiti get value for money by ensuring the money is well spent. The best way I can think of to achieve this would be to formalise and expand the UN's ad-hoc advisory group in order to turn into into a development agency. I have chosen this model because over the course of it's life the ad-hoc group has widely regarded as being successful and was instrumental in the production of the E/2009/105 report which lead to real and important improvements to life in Haiti prior to 2010's earthquake. It is also broadly representative of the global community while keeping the Haitian government at it's core. Despite these successes though it would be a mistake to simply give this group more powers. First I think that a few changes need to be made to it's structure;

• It needs to be larger. While its current size of seven permanent members of the UN is fine for an advisory role if it is to take a more proactive role then it needs to be expanded. I think the best way to do this would be to leave it as a seven/eight seat group but allow each of those seats to have two representatives plus support staff. For Haiti's guaranteed seat their representatives can be the Haitian President and the Haitian Prime Minister if they so wish.
  

• It needs a chairperson. Sadly the chair of the advisory group, Hedi Annabi was killed during the earthquake. This has created a vacancy and the opportunity to have the group chaired by a world class statesman who is skilled at negotiating with the variety of national governments and private corporations who are involved in the reconstruction effort. Bill Clinton is the obvious choice because he is already doing a similar job. If he has no interest in the job then any former US President would be suitable for the role along with a variety of other people including but not limited to Brazil's Lula Da Silva, France's Christine Lagarde and Canada's Michelle Jean provided they are prepared to leave their current offices.

• It needs a formal voting structure. With representatives of seven different nations decision making is always going to be difficult. Therefore I suggest a simple majority vote with the Chair and the Haitian delegation holding vetoes.
  
• It needs to be more representative. Although the current representatives from Benin, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Spain and Trinidad & Tobago represent four continents and another Caribbean island. I am concerned that too many of them are members of the Paris Club, France has no representative despite it's long history with Haiti and that there is no representative from the far east or middle east. I also concerned that although Britain is not represented the Commonwealth is over-represented by both Trinidad & Tobago and Canada which appears to have given up on democracy in favour of direct rule from Britain. This is a serious concern because on the evidence available since the earthquake I wouldn't put it past Britain to try and ruin the reconstruction effort just to make me look bad. Therefore I propose that Canada steps down and France takes their place if the chair goes to an American or to America providing it doesn't hold the chair. I would also like to see an eighth seat added that would go to either Singapore or the UAE as these are both countries with sophisticated economies that are located in the eastern hemisphere.

Of course this stills leaves the large area of what this bodies remit should be and this is the area on which I have been unable to do any research whatsoever. However I think in the immediate term it should act as trust fund through which donations can be funneled and have full responsibility for the relief effort specifically getting the homeless into appropriate temporary shelter in time for the rainy season. Beyond that they should take responsibility for infrastructure projects such clean water at the provision of energy. It will of course retain is observatory role over other aspects of Haiti's development and can take on extra roles that the Haitian government wishes to give it.