Doing things properly can’t be optional

So from this, and other comments from States members, I gather there’s not much sympathy for Home Affairs or president Mary Lowe over the governance issues that have been exposed by that external review of the committee’s behaviours.

Come to that, I’ve even had former States members interrupting each other to recall past alleged failures by some of the political individuals on Home, some of which others have expressed in the letters pages here.

However, while there is still much to be said about the whole affair, the baton really passes to Scrutiny – and the success of its involvement hinges on who it calls, the answers it gets from them and the documents it can rely upon to challenge Home’s notion of good governance.

Personally, I don’t think the committee’s politicians can add much to that. They can’t even agree how they handled the ambush of the police chief with an individual complainant, although they have inadvertently and cheerfully confirmed that they didn’t follow the agreed complaints procedure.

Which brings me on to the underlying topic today – the role of States members, what we need them to do and how we expect them to conduct themselves.

I’ve said before that anyone who stands for public office has my admiration and deserves yours too. It takes guts and stamina to do so. What’s that you say, less so under island-wide voting? Well, we shall see, because that’s a whole further set of unknowns.

In the meantime, today’s Assembly is already in uncharted waters. Senior and former States members I’ve spoken to about this all agree: not since before the dark days of Occupation, if it even happened then, have we had such a divided Chamber.

Febrile and toxic, the current chief minister called it in January. What he and others mean is that, for the first time, members are less prepared to compromise in the best interests of the island.

Advancing individual views, ambitions and agendas have become more important or more consuming than adopting a helicopter view of moving the ship of state forward, which is why the economy and other vital issues receive such scant attention. ‘Winning’ is more important than supporting the consensus view.

This is why the behaviours and conduct of individual States members are so important.

Today’s demands on deputies are greater and more onerous than at any time (save, perhaps, the Occupation) while the external climate has evolved out of recognition.

Elsewhere, standards of conduct, compliance and regulation are at historic highs while the parameters within which deputies operate are embarrassingly minimal: ‘to act in the public interest’.

That, of course, is entirely how a member chooses to define it and, to use a topical example, we can see that how Home Affairs members wish to challenge law enforcement and hold its senior staff to account is outside the professionals’ understanding of what’s acceptable or proportionate. And Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary appear to agree.

Presidents and committee members of the major departments have considerable influence, affect islanders’ lives in myriad ways and exercise huge budgets.

Were those private sector organisations, not only would scrutiny of members be greater and expectations of performance higher, shareholders wouldn’t tolerate them unless they possessed relevant skills and experience.

This isn’t in any way to denigrate States members. Instead, it is to emphasise that at the higher committee and presidential levels they are much more like non-executive directors on company boards.

Which is why behaviour – and who polices that personal conduct – is so important in a system where the only effective electoral oversight is every four years.

Additionally, of course, island-wide elections at least hold the possibility of reduced parish involvement with ‘their’ deputies and therefore less knowledge of how individuals act, the views they express and they way they react under pressure.

What, as a random example, if you had a committee/board which was oblivious to today’s standards of behaviour and which felt it wholly appropriate to get involved in minute detail, to try to catch out their executive team every step of the way and to delay proper strategic planning?

Quite apart from creating a toxic and morale-sapping environment for staff, it would also likely be detrimental to the performance of the department as a whole.

So external reviews are pretty key because, in the outside world, a board should undertake a formal and rigorous annual evaluation of its own performance and that of its committees and individual directors.

All of which is a roundabout way of suggesting that in the rather different world of Guernsey politics, with limited oversight and virtual sovereign state responsibilities, how individual deputies discharge their duties is of enormous significance.

So on the limited occasions when external review takes place, there’s greater need to pay attention to any findings.

The danger is if such challenge can be ignored. One thing for ‘lessons to be learned’, quite another for independent, expert feedback to be dismissed by those on the receiving end as a rubbish report.

Scrutiny, in these circumstances, cannot be voluntary; accept if favourable, reject if not. That can be rough for individuals at times, but islanders rather expect their States members to act in a statesman-like manner.

Today’s climate demands that they do, while voters also have a part to play in this.

How suited for purpose in today’s world is an Assembly of independents permanently at war with each other? How damaging is it for us to vote for so-and-so because s/he’ll ‘shake them up a bit’?

Good governance exists to facilitate effective, entrepreneurial and prudent management that can deliver the long-term success of a company.

If we want and expect that from the States, I’m damned if I can see how demonstrating good governance can be optional.