'Why I changed my mind on island-wide voting'

I have changed my mind and I will explain why.

When I stood for election in 2012, it was in order to focus on addressing the budgetary 'black hole,' not least through ensuring delivery of the financial transformation programme, which was behind schedule. With three extensions of the corporate tax regime approved by this States, bringing in an additional £15m. a year and the FTP saving £28.7m. every year, the budget is back in balance this year, the deficit having reached its zenith of £37m. during the last States' term.

In deciding whether to seek re-election this year, I asked myself 'what is it that I want for Guernsey?' In answering that question, in a recent speech, I suggested an ambitious but realistic goal: for Guernsey to be the healthiest and happiest community in the world by 2026, with a sustainable environment and a secure, successful and stable economy.

While I have been encouraged by the positive response I have received from across the community, our electoral system makes it impossible to test support for such an idea outside my electoral district of St Sampson's. (Even within an electoral district, a vote for a candidate cannot be interpreted as support for all that candidate's ideas, as it could be simply an attempt by a voter to keep another candidate out who the voter considers to be a worse alternative.)

As Nigel De La Rue put it in his letter to you, 'our system allows us to vote only for individuals not ideas... we have been denied the ability to vote for a preferred set of policies'. Voters are confined to choosing from among those candidates that happen to stand in their district and who the voters judge might make a reasonable fist of it.

We expect voters to make this judgement on the back of anodyne individual 'manifestos' (written to try and offend the least) and perhaps a few minutes on the doorstep; voters cannot in any meaningful way choose a suite of policies or a direction of political travel. This perceived voter disempowerment is the reason that our political system produces apathy and low turnouts; as well as discontent and frustration post-election with our politicians, political process and political decisions.

The community is crying out to know in which direction the island is headed; they want to have confidence that their politicians are working together to take us to that destination; and they want their political leaders to be thinking beyond one States' term, the politics of potholes or securing their own election.

This requires a discipline which is absent from our political system. (Let's face it, we can't even ensure that members of committees operate a form of 'collective responsibility' to adhere to a majority decision amongst themselves.)

Despite the perceived 'yes, yes, no' nature of some decisions taken, our electoral system is not in fact trying to find good folk to serve on the (Vicar of) Dibley parish council.

While we are only a community of 63,000 people, our government is required to make 'national' policy decisions (a current example being the system of secondary education) and respond to international challenges.

I – and I suspect all my colleagues – don't particularly fancy the idea of 'party politics' and toeing a party line at the behest of a party whip. But a political system that permits (or even encourages) personal, idiosyncratic political whimsy is no longer fit for our community's needs in the 21st century; indeed, it might be argued that it is a self-indulgence or selfishness which we can no longer afford. As ever, our community cannot have it both ways: congratulating ourselves for having a political system without the ideological divides that exist elsewhere whilst at the same time continually criticising our independent deputies for being just that – independent.

The future can be different. IWV will not of course, of itself, be a panacea to the real and perceived frustrations with our political system. But I think it is inevitable that in order to make IWV work effectively, in order to enable voters to make meaningful choices in exercising their 38 individual votes in 2020, it will be necessary for candidates to group around common platforms of policies. That will be a positive development in our political culture – and that is why I supported IWV.

DEPUTY GAVIN ST PIER,

Treasury and Resources minister.