Despite this being part two of last month’s scribblings about how Guernsey ought to re-consider its future, the world itself has dramatically changed around us, largely courtesy of a capricious US president. But we cannot ignore that and it further highlights that our own machinery of government needs re-consideration if we are to navigate both our internal challenges and those increasingly imposed upon us by a volatile outside world.
There is a lot to unpack here, but perhaps a good place to start would be with Policy & Resources and its very public U-turn over territorial tax. At the February meeting (only two weeks ago at the time of writing), all five members voted against an amendment brought by Deputies Camp and Helyar which sought to remove territorial tax from further consideration by P&R’s tax sub-committee. It was defeated by 23 votes to 13.
Yet a mere two weeks later, P&R formally announces it has been dropped. It should never have been up for consideration, as it was made plain back in 2023 by EY and Giba that it risked grey listing and substantial detriment to our finance sector – something that P&R member Deputy Parkinson has consistently refused to accept. Consequently, it is a move that has been welcomed by the local finance industry, not least because of the ongoing reputational damage to confidence and the stability of Guernsey as a place to do business (which was the point of the amendment in the first place). However, since we do not have an executive form of government, the Assembly (which is sovereign) had effectively directed P&R to retain it.
In my opinion, that was a very bad decision on behalf of 23 members of the Assembly that voters in Guernsey recently elected. That said, as we are talking about a sub-committee of P&R – it might be argued that they are within their rights to take it out of their terms of reference. But I do wonder what the other 18 deputies who voted to keep it in feel about this apparent disregard for their wishes?
But P&R has form in acting in this somewhat autocratic manner. Two of their number (Deputies St Pier and Parkinson) have signed up to a requete on a consideration of cannabis for future legalisation. Now, disregarding the fact that the opportunity to ensure that the Assembly considered allocating any resource to this during the very recent Government Work Plan debate was not taken by any of the requerants (or even raised), the requete actually states that no consultation has been undertaken on it at all. This is in complete contradiction to the stated philosophy of this P&R to work collaboratively with other members of the Assembly.
While on the subject of that requete, the lead member (Deputy Leadbeater) is now mired in a code of conduct regarding how he has (apparently) not accurately reported on some divested shares in any business that has an interest in cannabis-related activity. On top of which he is being personally targeted by another deputy (Curgenven) who is unhappy about being removed from a Home Affairs sub-committee on how police complaints are handled. Apparently, all of this has been so upsetting that Deputy Curgenven has considered resigning as a deputy.
But there is more ‘trouble at t’mill’. We now learn that Deputy Camp is considering resigning from Economic Development due to differences of opinion over things like the Heathrow subsidy and allocating a few hundred thousand pounds to a consultant report on the future of the finance sector. Having witnessed the debacle with Flybe in the 2016-2020 term in which the then president (yes, the same Deputy Parkinson) provided some £850,000 subsidy for, in my opinion, very little net benefit and having read a very underwhelming report on this resulting ‘strategy’ for the finance sector, I am inclined to agree with Deputy Camp.
Now the current president of ED (Deputy Kazantseva-Miller) refutes that any divergence of views is unwelcome and in fact, chose her committee members in order to have a range of input.
This philosophy was echoed in a recent article by former deputy Peter Roffey who believes that a divergent view on a committee is helpful. But the reality of encouraging a diversity of views on committees often results in discontent which manifests itself in ongoing attempts to derail policy even after an Assembly decision to endorse a direction of travel has been agreed. Education is a prime example from the last term. It is not surprising then, that islanders wonder why nothing seems to get done.
So although we seem to be heading towards a by-election to elect who (today) will be a backbencher and whose job it will be to just turn up for a couple of days or so on 11 months of the year at States meetings – perhaps there may actually be some upcoming vacancies on two committees after all. One on Economic Development and one on Education, Sport & Culture (if Deputy Curgenven does actually throw in the towel). Although if he does – we will need yet another by-election.
For older readers, the foregoing has all the hallmarks of a Brian Rix farce (younger readers should Google that). However you look at it, the public may be forgiven for thinking that the wheels seem to be coming off this ‘summer of love’ Assembly – and this is even before we get to the real challenge – how to address what is left of the tax proposals and our island finances.
Can we fix any of this?
Well, nothing we can do will change a capricious US president or a UK prime minister who holds the record for U-turns. But yes, locally, maybe. Perhaps the best way to approach this is to depict government as akin to the multi-headed hydra from Greek mythology.
To begin with, one ‘head’ is the dawning reality that the public at large does not have enough of a grasp of how government functions (or dysfunctions). Another head therefore is the consequent skill sets, or lack thereof, of the deputies islanders then choose to elect. Certainly, this is all exacerbated by the election system we employ which represents yet another head – and as another saying goes ‘insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results’.
Now if we leave aside the pastoral or community responsibilities of being elected, a deputy performs three distinct functions as a member of the States: oversight of government services via the committee system (for example, education and health); involvement in policy development around those services; and finally, participation in the Assembly as a legislature or body of lawmakers.
So, if you think about this rationally, overseeing services delivery is far more operational in nature, policy development is necessarily more strategic and ideally requires some level of experience in the specific area, and being a lawmaker is extremely specific in terms of expertise. Now if you add to this blind luck as to whether we have candidates who have any of this experience in the first place and it being even more unlikely that successful deputies actually get to match their experience with a relevant committee – what could possibly go wrong?
But the next challenge is the committee system itself and very particularly the independent mandate that each has which, not surprisingly, encourages silo thinking as opposed to an holistic approach to prioritisation of resources. Essentially, a further set of hydra heads.
The final elements that cannot be ignored are in relation to the fact that very necessary scrutiny of government is conducted primarily internally. This is a key area requiring change for repairing the lack of trust in government that undoubtedly exists. That is considerably exacerbated by the rise of social media as the seemingly preferred medium of exchange between the public and their representatives.
This all amounts to quite a multi-headed hydra dragon that needs to be slayed. Our problem unfortunately, is that we actually have a deadline to do so (2032) when our revenue finances turn permanently red if nothing changes. Furthermore, the only people who could effect change or alter government are the members of the Assembly themselves and we have to remember another age-old saying: ‘turkeys don’t vote for Christmas’.
What could change look like?
The size of the task is daunting and would certainly take more than one Assembly to achieve, even if there was broad agreement both within and outside of government about what needs to be done.
A starting point may be the current investigation by Sacc which is apparently looking again at the electoral system. For my part, I have given a lot of thought to the practicalities involved and you can read more on my website, thebigconversation.gg.
