Guernsey Press

Sacc must fulfil its IWV promise

ACCORDING to a Guernsey Press article of 5 February 2019 (‘Sacc has its work cut out solving IWV puzzle’, by Nick Mann) there is a lack of progress in devising an electronic, web-based, voting system to be in place for the June 2020 island-wide vote. Are we, in a sneaky way, being prepared for a Brexit-type fiasco, Guernsey version, engineered by people opposed to IWV ?

Published

The referendum on IWV took place on 10 October 2018, and in the Guernsey Press of 18 October – only one week later – two articles (‘Technology offers a whole new way to manage IWV’ and ‘Electronic voting will need to be in place before the next election’) appeared to indicate that technology exists to provide a secure internet-based IWV. This was four months ago, and according to my information Sacc has still not contacted the writers of these two articles for advice and further discussions. Why?

One cannot, of course, expect our deputies to be conversant with the technology required in this area. So can Sacc advise the date on which its advisory panel of relevant local technology experts was set up to assist with writing and testing the necessary software to manage the island-wide voting system?

On the matter of manifestos referred to in that article of 5 February, there is mention of, possibly, a phone book-size of manifestos to be sent to every household on the island. Really.Whose costly and crazy idea is it to use an obsolete medium (paper) in our digital age when all government information today has to be accessed online? Why not simply add the prospective candidates’ manifestos to the government’s official website under the existing section ‘States’ Members (Deputies/Politicians)’?

Besides, manifestos are of very limited use. How can candidates fill up to four sides of A4 paper on declaring their policies and aims when they have no idea of the subjects to come up for debate beyond the first few months of their four-year term? To be sure, how many deputies covered the recent subjects of waste strategy, L’Ancresse wall, fuel tax, road speed limits, assisted dying, organ donation etc. in their 2016 manifestos?

Candidates’ manifestos (declarations) are non-committal, meaningless, and intentionally vague so as to avoid public disagreement. But come voting time in the Assembly, the deputies will vote according to their own preference, political views, tribal agenda, or their conscience; the public’s majority view counts for nothing.

As I suggested last year, manifestos should be replaced by CVs which are truly indicative of candidates’ skills and experiences in considering complex issues within the island’s social, economic and environmental constraints. New candidates might actually benefit from including their CVs as evidence of their experience in managing a business and of their familiarity with evaluating the risks and benefits of long-term projects.

A promise was made to deliver on the IWV referendum, and reassurances (and replies to the above two questions) are urgently needed from Sacc.

PHIL DUPRE,

Address withheld.