Plenty of challenges for 2021

The document formerly known as the Policy & Resource Plan was one of the most frustrating elements of the last Assembly.

In a bid to bind together the most important strands of government in one overarching strategy, the States mostly ended up tying itself in knots.

Committees resisted attempts to make hard choices to the point where everything became a priority and progress on projects was rare.

As the calendar turns the page, States members cannot afford a repeat of such procrastination. The problems of 2021 are simply too pressing and too important.

Thankfully, the signs are good that the new Assembly remains determined to live by its ‘action today’ mantra.

However, while Future Guernsey may be in the bin the problems it sought to address are not.

If anything Covid-19 has brought renewed urgency to the need to fix air and sea links, improve digital connectivity and transform health and care services.

By this time next year the island needs genuine progress in all three areas.

All of that will have to be done while dealing with the inevitable disruption of the early months of Brexit and rolling out a huge vaccine programme.

Nor will the island’s ailing finances wait for calmer waters. The tax review was urgent in 2019 when as much as £132m. extra was said to be needed to fix Guernsey's public services. How large is that figure in the post-Covid world?

And of course, hanging over everything is the future of secondary education. Teachers, pupils and parents cannot be left in limbo for years while another grand plan is drawn up.

After all that, how much political and civil service capacity is left for the stalled project to develop the east coast seafront, solve the long-term care conundrum, review the Island Development Plan, draw up a justice policy and get secondary pensions up and running?

2020 was a hard year for all the reasons that nobody expected.

2021 already looks challenging even before the unknowns become known.