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Pitcairn—In the Last Chance Saloon

The recent BBC television documentary series ‘British Treasure Islands’ provided a fascinating insight into the flora and fauna of the UK Overseas Territories, highlighting the huge range of biodiversity that is present; indeed, 90% of the biodiversity found within the UK is located in the territories. The isolation and inaccessibility of many of these territories was also a feature of the series, and how in many cases this distance from the rest of the world has helped to preserve their natural beauty and the customs of the local populations. However, there was little critical comment on the political, economic and social features that have defined the territories in recent years. This may have helped the programme-makers to gain access to some of the territories, but without broader context the viewers were left with a very partial picture—no more so than in regard to the Pitcairn Islands. The islands of Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno (commonly known collectively as the Pitcairn Islands) make up a single territory; the last remaining UK Overseas Territory in the Pacific Ocean. Pitcairn, the only inhabited island of the group, has a population of 42 and a land area of 4.6 square kilometres. It is extremely remote, about 2,100 kilometres east–south-east of French Polynesia, and a supply ship from French Polynesia visits only four times a year. Henderson in particular has a fine natural environment; it is the best example in the Pacific of a large raised coral atoll and is an important breeding ground for seabirds. It has also been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Further, in March 2015 the UK government set up the largest, continuous marine reserve in the world in waters around the islands. But, due to a number of major underlying problems not mentioned in the BBC documentary, there are concerns over the future viability of the settlement. The first issue is the continuing shadow cast by concerns over child safety on Pitcairn. This March a former mayor was found guilty of downloading scores of hard core child abuse images and films, and this was a reminder of the serious allegations of systematic sexual abuse of children that were made against a large proportion of the adult male population a decade ago. Ultimately eight men were convicted; no mention of this was made in the documentary. With the population falling to dangerously low levels, the Island Council agreed a repopulation plan in 2013 to raise the population to around 50 (although an earlier plan had a target of increasing it to 80 by 2016).