£26,500 spent on making unstable Rouge Bouillon wall safe

Tuesday, 6 October 2026 10:50

By Harry Booth

It cost Jersey's government more than £26,500 to fix the unstable wall that caused traffic chaos for weeks on Rouge Bouillon this summer.

It had to step in when the deadline for the owners of the affected properties to address the issue passed.

Temporary traffic lights were put in place between Drury Lane and Palmyra Road for around seven weeks from the start of June because of concerns that an unstable wall was at risk of collapsing onto the footpath and road.

This caused long tailbacks along the road, particularly at school-run time.

The owners of the affected properties were originally given four weeks to carry out works to make the wall safe, and the deadline was extended for another fortnight, but the Regulation Department then stepped in, saying sufficient progress hadn't been made to address it.

It then exercised its powers under the law to enter the private land and do the work needed to make it safe.

More than £23,000 was spent on work to remove the danger, with road closure and management costs totalling over £3,000.

Planning and Regulation Minister, Senator Sir Mark Boleat, said:

"Officers are at present in the process of determining the proportion of costs to be assigned and recovered from the respective owners pursuant to Art.69 of the Planning and Building (Jersey) Law 2002, and the issuing of invoices is imminent.

"Failure to pay the reasonable costs will result in debt recovery in accordance with appropriate debt recovery procedures in association with the Law Officers Department.

The undertaking of the works in default under Art.69 of the Planning and Building (Jersey) Law 2002 constitutes enforcement action.

"Failure to comply with a dangerous building notice is an offence under Art.70 of the Law, and the Regulation Directorate is presently carefully considering its position, taking into account the guidance provided by the LOD regarding referrals of regulatory breaches, and acknowledging that the Attorney General is the ultimate authority in respect of all prosecutions in the Island."