The Guernsey Party was launched in August last year and put forward nine candidates for October’s election, of which six were successful.
These have gone on to be elected onto various States committees: ‘We’re spread quite widely and these committees have some pretty significant responsibilities,’ said party founder and former chairman Mark Helyar.
Deputy Helyar has now relinquished the chair to another member of the party, which has grown since the election, he said.
‘We’re building it up into a more formal political organisation so there’ll be the possibility for us to have something akin to a conference.’
He attributes the interest to the impact of the election: ‘I think the island-wide election has galvanised involvement with politics,’ he said.
Party members meet regularly to discuss States’ reports that are up for debate, but those members in the Assembly do not have to follow a party line: ‘We don’t have a whip,’ said Deputy Helyar. ‘They’re free to vote how they want.’
He said while it was good to see other sitting States members outside of the Assembly and committee meeting, he was pleased at how members were working with others. ‘Everybody is working really collaboratively together,’ he said.
After the new States of Guernsey Assembly reached its milestone 100 days, the party looked back on the goals it had set out for this period.
A lot of what it had listed had been acted upon, but not everything. ‘Where we’ve not achieved things there are wheels in motion, as it were,’ said Deputy Helyar. ‘I just wish we could go faster.’
Among the progress made was the proposed resolution of the Public Service Obligation process concerning the air service to Alderney and Deputy Helyar said when he was given the job of overseeing Alderney issues as a member of Policy & Resources he made it a priority to resolve this as quickly as possible.
That has made it easier to talk about the future relationship between the two islands in general.
One area that he would like to progress soon is having more local consultants and local people with expertise involved with the work of the States.
Several documents were published on the Guernsey Party’s website setting out the direction in which it wanted to go, and it also made clear that it did not support increases in taxation and intended to ‘aim for no tax increases during the next term, no GST [goods and services tax], maintain low taxation to be internationally competitive’.
Despite this, in the Budget debate Deputy Helyar, as treasury lead for Policy & Resources, found himself asking the Assembly to back rises in tax on things such as alcohol and tobacco.
He said during the debate that the ‘no taxes’ goal expressed by the party was a wish list.
Talking to the Guernsey Press he said that rather than raising taxes, improving the island’s economic performance by saving costs, for example, was the key. ‘The easy thing to do would be to turn around and say “we need another 2% on income tax”.
‘Our attention is very much focused on how do we raise sufficient capital to do different things.
‘My own view is that people should spend their money if they want, not have it taken off them.’
Deputy Helyar said that having published an update on its 100 Days document, the party will probably publish another update at 200 days.
‘This will be forward-looking,’ he said.
You need to be logged in to comment.