‘You wonder when these deputies are going to get a grip’

So it costs £1.2m. to elect 38 people to the Guernsey Talking Shop in 2025 (Guernsey Press 23 December). Actually not a lot in the context of the multi-millions the States wastes in the course of a typical year. And the increased cost since the last election was roughly in line with inflation too.

It’s when you sit back and start putting it in context that it takes on a different tone. The context in question being what it looks like from the perspective of a family struggling to make ends meet.

Thirty-eight deputies. Annual wage bill £2.1m. Four years. Total £8.4m., and that is without any voting for pay increases in the next four years.

So, election expenses included, that comes to a £9.6m. bill for these people who are there to make decisions on our behalf. Not counting expenses they incur on States business, with maybe off-island travel included, of course. Still not a lot in the context of a £350m. public sector pay bill, or £750m. States budget.

Until you look at it from the perspective of the working single mum on minimum wage, the hard-pressed young couple with a new baby and eye-wateringly high rent to pay, or the aged, infirm pensioner who might be trading off a meal to run the heating in the face of the frigid Force 6/7 Nor’easter.

There are roughly 65,000 people living in Guernsey and, roughly again, 25,000 households. The opportunity cost of that £9.6m. is significant.

It equates roughly to £148 for each man, woman, and child on the island. Or £384 per household.

Just think what you could buy with the latter. To help answer the question, take a look at the Which? top picks of 2025.

How about a 55in QLED TV. No. 4 in the list. Buy one and you still save £75. The Apple iPad at No. 17 in the list, and still have £55 left over. The new oven at No. 6, and, yes, save £85. More mundanely, spend that £384 on number three in the list, and get the wheelbarrow out for 276 bottles of classic tomato ketchup.

There is a serious point here. The magnitude of the numbers quoted in the Press regularly when it comes to States spending may make us angry but it happens so often there is a tendency for readers to become blase. When you look at them through the lens of those not just struggling to make ends meet, but also sometimes failing to do so, you wonder when these deputies are going to get a grip.

It’s not all their faults of course. The system within which they operate is questionable in the extreme. It seems to me island-wide voting is bound to lead to – no, not anarchy – but the governmental mess which we witness. All those disparate opinions, those seemingly endless amendments and then second thoughts. Here’s hoping 2026 will bring a different outcome, but I won't hold my breath.

Stuart Garner
St Martin’s