Guernsey Press

Gollop ‘would welcome a local Ministry of Transport’

QUESTIONS about the future of the Transport Licensing Authority followed a general update statement made by its president in the States Assembly.

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Deputy John Gollop. (Picture by Sophie Rabey, 29383883)

While John Gollop did his best to address these, the presiding officer, the Bailiff, Richard McMahon, pointed out to members that such questions were not in relation to the authority’s mandate and so should not really have been raised.

By the time he made this comment, though, Deputy Neil Inder had asked if Deputy Gollop was ‘looking for work’ after the TLA president said that it would be interested in perhaps looking to expand its responsibilities into sea travel and possibly even fishing licensing. The TLA was set up to oversee licence applications from airlines to operate to and from Guernsey. But following the implementation of a quasi-open skies policy, only airlines seeking to operate on the so-called lifeline routes between Guernsey and Alderney and Guernsey and Gatwick would need to apply for a licence.

In the last year, no licence applications had been received, said Deputy Gollop, and the authority had met only once under his presidency and that was to elect a vice-president. However, he said that now that the process of appointing an operator of the Guernsey-Alderney route had been concluded, he expected that it would need to meet after the agreement was finalised.

He said that the Government Work Plan was going to recommend the States rescind a resolution to review the role and constitution of the TLA, but this would be put on hold until after consideration of the island’s transport policies.

Deputy Lyndon Trott asked if Deputy Gollop thought quasi-open skies had been an absolute or only a partial failure, but Deputy Gollop said the committee was wary of giving opinions on that and other matters because it was not a policy responsibility of the authority. He said he could not determine the answer to that question anyway due to so much disruption to air travel due to the pandemic.

Deputy Gollop went on to say that he would welcome a Guernsey ‘Ministry of Transport’ being set up.