Tuesday 8 April 2014

Parties or a direct election - which will it be?


After posting the wording and report for my first States proposition, I want to now go into detail on why I have proposed this and what I see as the opportunity the debate will provide us.

But first, I want to make this point very clear - I make no apologies whatsoever for lodging this proposition. My manifesto said "I will propose that the Chief Minister be elected by the public" and I am sticking to that promise. We need more States Members who will actually do what they said they will during the elections, and fewer that just keep their heads down and hope not to upset enough people to stop them getting re-elected. I do not accept a single word of criticism that says I shouldn't be doing this. I promised I would, so I'm doing it.

Now onto the reasons for why this proposition is needed, because it is more complex than it first appears.

There is currently a vacuum of accountability in Jersey politics. The way we vote at the ballot box has only a nominal effect on who ends up in positions of power and what policies end up being implemented.

Some over-egg the importance of the Senators, and suggest that that is where our real influence can be found. I say this is nonsense. How we vote in a senatorial election has never influenced the make up of the government.

Our first two Chief Minister's were chosen by the States having not faced the electorate for three years, and having come 5th/6th when they did. Our current Chief Minister arguably has a much better mandate than the previous ones, but to get the job he had to beat the only other member with a greater mandate than him!

Half of the Council of Ministers are Deputies, including the portfolio with the biggest budget (in fact, the Deputy holding that portfolio has never faced a contested election at all!). Of the half that are Senators, only half of those were elected in the 2011 election, the rest having not faced a contested election for 3 years.

So only one quarter of the current Council of Ministers was determined by the last island-wide elections.

And how do we know that Ian Gorst got the votes that he did because they wanted him to be Chief Minister? Maybe they were actually voting for him because they liked him as Social Security Minister and wanted him to stay there. There is no way of indicating for what purpose you are voting for a candidate.

We, as voters, have no way of marking our ballot paper in an election to give a clear message as to what sort of government we want and whose vision we want to lead it. We have no way of kicking out a government and replacing it with a new one.


All of this considered, combined with the fact our electoral system is massively disproportionate, is it any wonder that the majority of islanders steer well clear from polling stations on election day? When there is no connection at all between how you vote and what you get, you can't blame anyone for feeling as if voting isn't worth their time.

As someone that believes in democracy and has a vision of a world that is better than the one that we live in (and hopefully you do to, seeing as you're reading my blog), this self evident truth is very depressing. Trying to convince my friends in Jersey to go out and vote is an almost impossible task. Contrast that with my friends in the UK, for whom going out to vote is second nature. It's just something you do. Your parents probably do it too. In fact, you may even be related to an elected councilor, or an enthusiastic activist.

Jersey does not have that necessary democratic culture, and we are a poorer island because of it. The government does not reflect the values of the community, and that is because the community is not ingrained into the government.


In my view, there is only one realistic way forward for democracy in Jersey, to fill that vacuum - party politics.

It is only a party system (with multiple parties, not just two) that will provide a framework for participatory politics, training up potential candidates and engaging with the community en masse.

This system of independents is hugely uninspiring, noninclusive and does not allow the best candidates to come forward. It is a club for a few as their play thing.

I dream of a politics in Jersey where elections see hundreds (maybe even thousands) of islanders actively campaigning for their local candidates, advocating the vision their party puts across and creating a new dynamic that is captivating so that islanders will be well informed and motivated to actually go out and cast their vote.

Only this system will give a team of elected representatives a true mandate to govern the island. Anything less is not democracy.


But what does all of this have to do with my proposition which is, arguably, completely incompatible with party politics?

Whilst I believe that a party system is the best way to fill that vacuum, it is not the only way.

With the Chief Minister about to propose increasing his powers, allowing him to hire and fire ministers, binding them to collective responsibility etc, it is urgent that something is done to balance what is otherwise, in my opinion, a power grab.

A vibrant party system will take time. We don't have it. If the Chief Minister's proposition wins, then the elections in October are a complete waste of time. The power will be taken away from that assembly and given to one person, who the public have no real influence on deciding who it is.

My proposition to have the Chief Minister elected by the public is a safety net. It aims to redress that balance between power and accountability.

For the first time in our history, the public will have a direct and unambiguous say in who leads our island and whose vision has a mandate. I believe that that election would be the most exciting we will have ever had and will captivate people to actually coming out to vote, because they will know that their vote actually counts for something,

It will go some way to re-energising our democracy.

Yes, there are practical problems with it. I completely accept that. But they aren't anywhere near as bad as the problems we have with the current system and the problems we will have if only Senator Gorst's proposition is accepted.

If the States reject my proposition there will be no democratic justification for accepting Senator Gorst's proposition.

If Senator Gorst wants more power, I give him this ultimatum - Form your party by October and stand on a joint platform with like-minded candidates. If you cannot do that, then you must accept that we need another mechanism to hold you to account.



Will my proposition succeed? Almost certainly not. I am ready for that. But we will have a debate, and in that debate these points will be made.

A rejection of my proposition and the principles behind it mean that there will only be one viable option left on the table - party politics.

We deserve a better democracy and it's time those in power got their act in gear and worked to deliver that change.


_____________________________________________________________________________________________


Reform Jersey invites all islanders to join us for a public discussion on these issues at a meeting at the Town Hall at 7.30pm on Thursday 24th April.

There will be guest speakers with experience of the previous collective responsibility debates, and I will be there to set out my case.

There will be plenty of time for members of the public to stand up and give their thoughts on the proposed changes or ask questions of the speakers if they wish.

This is our democracy, and we cannot let changes go past without our fair say.

Reform Jersey hopes to register as a political party in the next few months. If you wish to be involved, please get in touch with us either directly to me on s.mezec@gov.je or to reformjersey@gmail.com

11 comments:

  1. I respect the Senators a lot more than Deputies and Constables and until you get elected with a decent number of votes I think your ideas are trivial. To gain respect you have to put yourself forward on the whole Island Mandate.

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    1. A good idea is a good idea if it's a good idea.

      Rejecting something because of the title of the person proposing it is just small minded nonsense.

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    2. Its all down to who else sees it as a good idea.

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    3. Precisely. Title is irrelevant.

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  2. I don’t disagree with some of what you say, but I really think you need to tone down the rhetoric a little, because some of your statements are patently incorrect.

    ‘How we vote in a senatorial election has never influenced the make up of the government’ -This is just factually incorrect. ONLY those we elect influences who makes up our government.

    ‘ .. the rest have not faced a contested election for 3 years ‘ – As long as somebody was democratically elected, why does it matter if they were elected more than 3 years ago ?

    ‘We, as voters, have no way of marking our ballot paper in an election to give a clear message as to what sort of government we want, and whose vision we want to lead it’ – We do. By marking our chosen candidates names with an ‘X’.

    ‘. We have no way of kicking out a government and replacing it with a new one’ – We do. They are called elections.

    ‘ Is it any wonder the majority of islanders steer well clear from polling stations on election day’ – Some cohorts of the island (obviously not of your doing, but as ably demonstrated by the turnout which enabled your recent election with 200 odd votes), do indeed steer well clear. Many country parishes enjoy much higher participation rates.

    ‘Trying to get my friends in Jersey to go out and vote is an almost impossible task….. Jersey does not have that necessary democratic culture’ – Turnout and democracy are 2 very separate issues. Or perhaps you are suggesting that your own election, with such a small number of votes, was in some way undemocratic ?

    ‘there is only one realistic way forward for democracy in Jersey to fill that vacuum – Party Politics’ – Are you suggesting that people should be forced to join a party for their election to be democratic ? That is dictatorial and undemocratic in itself, and would appear to state that anybody who wished to stand on an independent basis would be unable to do so (And would render their election undemocratic) ? Even your favoured UK system has its fair share of independent candidates, and I'm not aware that you believe this is undemocratic ?

    'Jersey does not have that necessary democratic culture,..... The government does not reflect the values of the community, and that is because the community is not ingrained into the government.'
    That is absolute nonsense. Our community elects its members in fully democratic elections. The members are also much more ‘ingrained with community’ for the simple reason that they are likely to come face to face with the community on a much more regular basis than any place such as the UK, and are therefore feel a much greater degree of personal accountability for their decisions. Indeed this personal accountability is why small communities often favour independent members, as they prefer them to those who attempt to hide behind a party allegiance when unpopular or damaging decisions are made.

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  3. cont'd
    ‘The system of independents is hugely uninspiring, non-inclusive and does not allow the best candidates to come forward’ – That is a subjective judgement. Where is the proof that more people would turn out to vote if there were only party politics ? I don’t see how our current system is non-inclusive, as everyone is entitled to vote, and to personally berate any member of government they wish, either in person, or by any other form of communication ? Party politics absolutely does not lead to ‘the best’ candidates standing. That is just not provable in any way, shape or form.

    ‘Only this system will give a team of elected representatives a true mandate to govern the island’ – We have this already. They are called democratic elections where everybody is free to vote for whoever they see fit, and States members are free to choose their ministers.

    ‘If the Chief Minister's proposition wins, then the elections in October are a complete waste of time’ – Understood. If you honestly believe this, you obviously won’t mind confirming therefore that, if CM’s proposition wins, that you won’t waste yours and others time by standing in October ?

    ‘With the Chief Minister about to propose increasing his powers, allowing him to hire and fire ministers, binding them to collective responsibility etc, it is urgent that something is done to balance what is otherwise, in my opinion, a power grab.’ – Please explain how this differs from your favoured party system, where a party leader is able to dismiss cabinet ministers ? (And is restricted from electing ‘the best candidate for a job’ by dint of their membership of another political party ?)

    ‘A rejection of my proposition and the principles behind it mean that there will only be one viable option left on the table - party politics.’ – No, a rejection of your proposition might simply be a rejection of your proposition. There are any number of other viable options, the most obvious of which is that we continue as we are, whether it is a system you favour, or not.

    Notwithstanding the above, I don’t deny that allowing the public to elect a chief minister has a number of positive implications. The likelihood is obviously that the person garnering the most island wide votes would also become CM. Our history is littered with examples of where this might have been a good thing. In one instance however, it would have proved disastrous, and for those looking to oppose the proposition, that might be reason enough to vote against.

    Best of luck however.



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    1. I've literally never seen so many strawman arguments crammed into such a short message.

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    2. I think your blog has already answered all of the questions in the last two anonymous posts. The point is that there is a huge disconnect between our fragmented government/elections and the government we end up with.

      At election time I have no idea which candidate will end up chief minister. It may even be a deputy that I can't vote for because he/she is in a different district. In the UK a Conservative vote is also a vote for David Cameron as PM etc.

      When the CM assembles his/her council and makes their policies known it's too late. I wan't to know this before I go to the polls not afterwards.

      Our democratic system is broken in many ways. St Helier is underrepresented. Uncontested seats are far too common (and I believe that's the fault of the system i.e. combining roles of constable and states member in one person makes it less likely that someone will stand against the incumbent if they value them as constable even if they contribute little to the States, its also a product of constituencies that are too small).

      A single election day will help bring in party politics but we must accept that the island wide mandate has no future.

      Anon suggests that low turnout and democracy are not connected but that is not the case if the low turnout is the product of a flawed system of democracy.

      As you say, most of the above is straw man stuff i.e. no-one suggested that in party politics you are 'forced' to join a party.

      Jersey's government does not reflect the community. This is partly because a huge part of our community is underrepresented. We don't have "fully democratic elections" as anon suggests.

      I believe a party system would inspire more people to come forward as the parties would compete with each other to attract candidates. They would be much more active than a bunch of 50 odd independents.

      The difference between the CMs proposition and party politics is that the latter receives a clear mandate from the elections the former does not. The current elections give 50 odd members a mandate from either the whole island or a small part of it but those voting have no idea how their candidates will combine to form a government.

      Any system that makes it clear what form the government will take before we go to the polls is an improvement on our current system.

      There are problems as well though. One benefit of our current system is that ministers can be chosen from across the political spectrum (i.e. our soc sec and housing ministers are left of centre and our finance minister is right of centre).

      And as for the implication that Stuart Syvret would have been a disastrous CM, well we will never know that, but in a party system Stuart would only have got to power if his party also had lots of popular members and those members would be obliged to remove him if things weren't going well.

      Good luck with the debate.

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    3. Thanks for that comment anonymous. Saves me some time having to reply to each point.

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  4. You are creating an unworkable situation - the EXACT same issues that JDP tried on the same process, but failed completely. I don't want you to fail because an 'opposition' does ensure some semblance, I just don't want you in power (I have no fear of that though). But you are going to end up wasting your time and efforts setting up an internal process and trying to create a political party when you shoudl be focussing on the key efforts of achieving reform (NOT at a political level but at a social level). Let me give you one tip for which I won't charge RJ - by the time you have set up a political party, created a manifesto, procedures, you will be 50 and will loose yoru seat (probably well before then) because you focus on what DOESN'T matter - a true political tragic worries about seperation of powers (which personally I don't believe is an issue in Jersey however much you and Trevor Pitman go on about it), but either way - the voting punter doesn't care. They care about what does matter: jobs, employment, their bank balance. If you want to push a leftie agenda, her is the tip: Remove the need for husbands to have to "approve" their wife's desire to change their name - sure the tax legislation has changed, btu this hasn't. All this time you worry about the simple stuff, women are still oppressed.

    Anyhow - I will be joining your party, you will not knwo who I am, and I will wrestle the leadership off you within three years, and wrekc the party. It will happen and you wont' know it.

    Why, and how do I know this? Done it before my boy, and since you have never contributed nothign to society other than been a student without producing or contributing with any life experience, it will be a walk in the park. Someone as long in the tooth experience wise as me will do this.

    How much you want to put on it? £an annual States Member salary?

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    1. Think I'll just leave this masterpiece of a comment hanging in their air!

      First class!

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