‘We’ve got to get more people back into Town’ - new junior constable
Attracting more people back into Town is one of the main goals of newly-elected St Peter Port junior constable Diane Mitchell.
She emerged victorious in Wednesday’s election to replace former constable Jenny Tasker, beating fellow candidate Rosie Henderson by 68 votes to 27, with one spoiled paper.
Mrs Mitchell, who has been a parish douzenier since 2022, said she was ‘really elated’ by the result, adding that she had several ideas that she hoped would improve life for parishioners and other islanders coming into the capital.
‘We’ve got to get more people back into Town,’ she said.
‘I like the idea of making an umbrella arcade like the one in Barcelona, or yarn-bombing some of Town’s buildings in a similar style to what was done with the toppers on the island’s post boxes, but obviously on a larger scale.
'We need to encourage business as well, the Arcade used to be full of so many niche shops when I was younger and a lot of that has been lost.’
She added that she was looking forward to working with parish senior constable Zoe Lihou.
‘We have a good way of working together, I think we will make a good team.’
The election total of 95 votes was a turnout of just 1.28%. Douzenier Suzy Hollingsworth said the parish was ‘extremely disappointed’ with the turnout.
‘We need to get a lot more people involved in the future,’ she said.
