Editor Comment:

Vote? We are passing through a non-voting period, slickmelb.

Editor Comment:

Create a Phuket Beach Authority for consistent application of regulations with the Royal Thai Navy as enforcers.

Editor Comment:

How full of certainties you are, Laurie. Now beaches are ''a civic responsibility.'' In your dreams.

From Phuketwan, March 2012:

One of the elders of Phuket's tourism industry got it right when he told us: ''Even if Phuket has a perfect transport system and a great airport, it won't save Phuket once Phuket's beaches have been destroyed.''

That's the reason why Phuket's beaches form items one, two and three of Phuketwan's PHUKET 10/10 campaign. Our intention is to list 10 key points that must be fixed to ensure Phuket's future.

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and her government have the power to gift Phuket some cash for infrastructure when Cabinet meets on March 19-20 on Phuket.

But reforms are required that go beyond cash handouts. While Phuket can certainly use some long-overdue special projects, what's even more important is to reverse the damage being done to Phuket's most valuable tourist attractions - the beaches.

1. Phuket's Beaches in Peril
AFTER the 2004 tsunami, Phuket had the chance to start over. The island's beaches had all been washed clean. The opportunity was there. But the once-in-a-lifetime moment passed, and before long, the clutter and the chaos returned. Seven years on, and commercialisation is now on the verge of ruining some Phuket beaches. Unless the process is reversed soon, the chaos and the clutter is likely to destroy them all. Kata, Karon, Kata Noi, Laem Sing, Surin, Nai Yang and Nai Harn were once high on any list of Asia's best beaches, with Patong and Kamala a little bit further back and Bang Tao, Nai Thon and Mai Khao perfect on the right kind of day. Not any more. There isn't much time left.

2. Black Water
PERHAPS the worst sign of Phuket's coastal deterioration is the way in which pollution is allowed to happen. If German television camera crews can find bad water at Phuket's beaches, you can bet that do-nothing local authorities know it's there, too. The day will come when tourists start to fall sick because of the poor water quality at Phuket beaches. That will be the beginning of the end for Phuket tourism.

3. Jet-Skis and Scams
THE NUMBER of jet-skis continues to increase on Phuket's beaches. There's now hardly a stretch of sand on the island where jet-skis cannot be found. Insurance schemes have failed to halt the scamming in the past. Insurance is certain to fail again. Of all the private commercial operations on Phuket's public beaches, the jet-skis and the continuing scams remain the biggest black mark.

A Potential Solution
INSTEAD of being the responsibility of look-the-other-way local authorites - they continue to show a lack of concern for preservation and protection - it's time for all of Phuket's beaches to be placed under one authority. That authority can then impose consistent standards and control the level of commercial activity on all the beaches. If the profits from controlled, selective commercial activities were devoted to protecting and improving the beaches, then Phuket's once-golden sands would stand a chance of being returned to their former glory. If the numbers of visitors to Phuket's beaches continue to grow, there will be no room for swimmers and jet-skis. Phuket must either do away with jet-skis entirely, as Krabi and Phang Nga have already managed to do, or push them offshore to operate more safely from pontoons. Heed the example of Boracay, now Asia's top beach. A radical problem needs a radical solution: we'd recommend empowering the Royal Thai Navy, which already has a role protecting Thailand's coast, with enforcing the rules as set out by the new Phuket Beach Authority.

And there's more:

4. Balancing Phuket's Budget
JUST A FEW years ago, the then Governor of Phuket was despondent when we appeared for an interview. That morning, Bangkok has slashed in half the budget he reckoned he needed to run Phuket efficiently. He was not the first or the last governor to find himself in that situation. Last month, former Phuket Governor Chadejin Insawang proposed a commonsense answer: don't continue to base the sum that goes back to Phuket on the small number of citizens registered here, a false and misleading figure. Give Phuket back a percentage of the money it generates as revenue for Thailand. To retain Phuket as an appealing destination for tourists, quality infrastructure has to be provided and maintained. It's a wise idea to make that sum realistic. If Phuket only had to cope with 320,000 registered citizens and their families, the old system would suffice. But with the real figure of people on Phuket probably three times the registered number, it's vital for Phuket's budget to be revised.

5. Connecting with Asean
AS A TOURIST holiday destination, Phuket is a one-trick circus pony. The other pony, property, broke a leg and is hobbling out of the ring. Whenever there are quakes in the tourism industry, whenever the tourism needle turns down, Phuket suffers. While a quick injection of concessions to foreign property owners might get the other pony back into action, help seems unlikely to come at a time when overseas investors are even being blamed for the holes in the circus tent. Phuket's geographical position close to the major Asean members, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, makes it ideal as Asean's southern centre in Thailand. With the Asean economic community arriving fast in 2015, give Phuket a larger role in Asean by creating training facilities here. Shift the relevant parts of Foreign Affairs to Phuket. Make Phuket a showcase for trade and commerce within Asean. Boost Phuket's role in national affairs. Make Thailand's most international island-city the springboard for all southern regional connections.

6. Health Should be a Priority
A TOURIST from Singapore wondered how long it would be before a helicopter arrived to carry his injured friend off Patong beach to a Phuket City hospital. The answer: many more years yet. While Phuket's hospital doctors and nurses do a wonderful job, health and safety are still not the priorities they should be for tourists, or for residents. The days may have passed when it was common to have patients transferred from the scene of a crash to hospital in the back of a pickup, with a paramedic holding aloft a saline drip. But it still takes far, far too long for an ambulance to reach drowning victims at most Phuket beaches when every second counts in saving a life. As for the heroic struggle of Phuket's public hospitals to cope with too many patients . . . a visit to Vachira Phuket when the wards are filled to overflowing gives a good indication of the levels of government support. A trip to the hospital morgue, largely in the open air out the back, confirms that even the 2004 tsunami did not persuade Bangkok to spend on Phuket's preparedness for disaster. And if you happen to become lost at sea, do not expect an aerial search. A group of survivors from a dive boat capsize in which seven people drowned in 2009 had to hail a passing fisherman and use his mobile telephone to call in their own rescue. Phuket still has to send bodies to Bangkok or Surat Thani for autopsy. The big ''what if'' is, will Patong Hospital be able to cope if or when there is a big bus crash on the Patong side of the hill, and ambulances from the better-equipped east coast hospitals are not able to get through? Stop corruption: health and education need the cash.

7. What are Schools For?
A EUROPEAN friend with Thai children entrusted them to the best local school on Phuket, where his son topped the class. But when the 15-year-old had to head to Europe and a new school, he was put back two years, in with the 13-year-olds. That's the scale of the gap between public schools on Phuket and throughout Thailand and schooling overseas. A better education can be bought by the fortunate few at the private schools that have proliferated with the internationalisation of Phuket. But many local Phuket children face big classes, rote learning and a future where their potential will be forever unfulfilled. Teaching children how to think needs to be the priority, not computer tablets and gimmicks that win popular acclaim but really don't address the chronic issue. Kill corruption, invest the money in necessities, and Phuket's children stand a fair chance.

8. Winning Hearts in the Air . . .
PHUKET airport is being enlarged and expanded but Phuket's popularity is growing even faster. With 8.4 million passengers in 2011 through an airport built for 6.5 million and a record one million-plus arrivals and departures on Phuket in January alone, the airport enlargement to cope with 12.5 million passengers in mid-2015 may not be enough. The airport is Phuket's most important piece of infrastructure. There has been no inkling yet as to what the plan might be beyond mid-2015. Phuket and the Andaman's tourism future relies on that vision.

9. And on the Ground
WHETHER it's entirely accurate or not, we are still struck by the consultants who were allegedly asked to draw up a public transport plan for Phuket and who came back saying: ''There's no need for public transport on Phuket. Everyone on Phuket uses their own motorcycles.'' Phuket has one recent public transport success story. The pink bus service that operates using traditional seung taews to crisscross Phuket City on the east coast, provides safe, low-cost transport for travellers in that part of the island. Developing equally successful solutions for all of Phuket is the objective now. Getting around by tuk-tuks or taxis on Phuket can be hideously expensive, yet fares and standards matching those of Bangkok are what tourists demand and deserve. A major rethink is required. It's a shame the issue has been left for so long.

10. Success from PHUKET 10/10 to Phuket 2020
PHUKET and the Andaman contains some of the world's finest resorts amid some of Thailand's most beautiful countryside and bays. Yet in the real world, even on holiday in a tropical paradise, life is never perfect. When a guest has a problem inside a resort, a good general manager will fix it as fast as possible. On Phuket, all around the island's many outstanding resorts, there are problems that have yet to be fixed. It is not our intention to spell out those problems here yet again: they are well-known and widely understood.
Certainly, there are issues, but Phuket 2012 maintains plenty of appeal. Tourists are arriving in record numbers. Despite the continuing good news, we are obligated to ask: will that appeal last if Phuket's problems go unfixed?
Two decades is the period of time usually categorised as a generation. Casting back to the turn of the century, Phuket was a beautiful, unspoiled place. We are now just over halfway towards the next-generation year, 2020. How many people can say with honesty that Phuket will be a better place in 2020 than it is now, or than it was in 2001, if those Phuket problems remain unsolved?
In the past, many people have left it to others to right Phuket's wrongs. That can no longer continue. The problems have grown larger, with Phuket. Today, in a world where the Internet and social media report both good and bad events around the clock, instantly, news travels faster than ever.
With Phuket's innovative quarterly honorary consuls' forums, the steady growth of its own media and a better-informed population, Phuket's attitudes are fast moving from a national viewpoint to an international outlook. Along with others, Phuketwan does its best every day to report the good with the bad, and to also report events in other tourist destinations around the region and the world. Bali shares many of Phuket's issues: in the beautiful Caribbean, some tourists destinations suffer serious crime. The point is that the 'Jaws' days when authorities could suppress the bad news and only allow the good to be reported have gone.
We once asked a director of the Phuket Tourism Authority of Thailand office what he would say to corrupt officials on Phuket if he had the chance. ''Do your job,'' he responded. ''Do your job.'' And let's face it, if everybody had done their jobs between 2001 and today, Phuket would be close to perfect. Even so, assailed by the 2004 tsunami and many smaller issues along the way, Phuket has survived and deservedly prospered as a tourist destination. Yet the mantra expressed by our friend, the former TAT official, remains true. We have no hesitation in repeating it: ''Do your job.''
Phuketwan tries to do its job, by reporting daily, without fear or favor, both the bad and the good in a world where news of all kinds can be read instantly, everywhere. There is no prospect of a return to the past, which is why events on Bali are reported as completely and openly today as events in Singapore, Sydney, Shanghai . . . or on Phuket.
We have offered some suggestions in the PHUKET 10/10 series because we want to make Phuket a more perfect place for residents and visitors, a place with a prosperous future, a place of high international standards both inside and outside resorts. And we sincerely hope that whoever writes the 'PHUKET 2020' series is able to report: the job has been done.

Editor Comment:

Not plain enough for you to understand, Laurie? Too bad. As we've said so often, no need for you to comment if you have nothing of value to add.

Editor Comment:

As we've often said, Laurie, we have no interest in being told what to do by readers or in accepting ''challenges.'' You're an impediment to our efforts to change Phuket for the better. Stop wasting our time.

Editor Comment:

There is nothing to debate, Laurie. Please respond to the article topics by adding value. Try to ignore your desire to pursue the trivial.