A heartfelt warning about local politics

Tuesday 25 February 2020

On the day of his mother's funeral, Deputy Peter Roffey has released an emotional statement as he tries to lay bare to the public how local politics has become a "battleground".

Having first been elected to public office in 1982, he has undoubtedly seen many changes - including the advent of social media, although he is not known to have any accounts of his own.

The fractions within the current States of Guernsey came home to roost for Deputy Roffey on the day his wife died, and as his mother lay dying, fuelled by misinformed comments on social media, and some media reports themselves.

Yesterday, Deputy Roffey was cleared of breaching the States Members Code of Conduct. A complaint had been lodged against him, and the other four members of the Committee for Education, Sport and Culture last year.

Pictured: The ESC President, Deputy Matt Fallaize, was the only one found guilty of breaching the States Members Code of Conduct.

The Code of Conduct Panel cleared Deputy Roffey, and ESC members Deputy Rhian Tooley, Mark Dorey and Richard Graham. However it upheld a complaint against ESC President, Deputy Matt Fallaize, and he has accepted a caution.

He was found to have breached the Code of Conduct through his actions regarding the appointment of Guernsey's Head of Curriculum and Standards. 

Deputy Roffey has said he was not involved in that situation at all, and there was no evidence to suggest he was. He believes that a conversation between himself, and Deputy Carl Meerveld who lodged the complaint could have resolved the matter quickly.

However Deputy Meerveld lodged a complaint against all five members of ESC, and that has hung over their heads until yesterday.

Pictured: Deputy Carl Meerveld.

"Of course I am delighted that the panel have completely cleared me of any breach of the code of conduct in respect of what I consider to be a series of completely vexatious complaints made against me by Deputy Meerveld," said Deputy Roffey. "Indeed they concluded that I had no case to answer.

"I have never had any such allegations made against me before over my lengthy time in politics. The complaints were based on a series of completely untrue statements from Deputy Meerveld. For example he alleged that I had participated in a series of interviews when I definitively had not. Further he alleged I had influenced processes where I had done absolutely no such thing and where there was not a scrap of evidence to suggest otherwise. 

"It is not surprising that Deputy Meerveld’s allegations against me proved to be wildly incorrect as he was a complete 3^rd party to the events he was complaining about and appears to have gathered his “facts” from social media and media reports. I presume he will now offer a full apology for levying false allegations against me."

Express has approached Deputy Meerveld for comment.

Pictured: The Code of Conduct panel cleared Deputies Dorey, Roffey, Tooley and Graham but upheld a complaint against Deputy Fallaize. 

Deputy Roffey continued, explaining how the Code of Conduct complaint against him, the first in his lengthy political career, came at a deeply upsetting time in his personal life. He said he was "deeply upset by the process" and that to say he is "considerably vexed with Deputy Meerveld" is an understatement.  

He says that he "found this set of completely false allegations so distressing," for a number of reasons which he has decided to address publicly: 

• Notice of these false allegations being made against me by Deputy Meerveld was served on me on the day my wife died
• During much of the time when my misdeeds were alleged by him to have taken place I was actually supporting her through radiotherapy in Southampton
• The threat of this code of conduct proceeding hung over my head throughout my early months of grieving
• The actual hearing into Deputy Meerveld’s complaints took place as my mother was dying in the PEH. She passed away two days later while I was still awaiting the panel’s “verdict”
• Predictably the complaints were found to be completely without foundation but the distress which this process caused me during what has been the worst period of my life was huge

"Of course I fully accept that Deputy Meerveld could not have known exactly what was going on in my life," said Deputy Roffey. "But the real point is that if he had even bothered to contact me to check his “facts” before making these untrue claims about me, which he must of known were nothing more than mere supposition or conjecture on his part, he could have saved me very much grief. 

"Just an email to me asking if his understanding of events was factually correct before he lodged these baseless allegations would have short circuited the process, saving time, money and upset." 

Addressing the changing nature of local politics, Deputy Roffey said it is becoming a "battle ground" and the Code of Conduct is used as a weapon.

"I really fear that the assumption of decency on one’s colleagues’ behalf seems to have gone out of local politics, which is now rapidly becoming a battle ground where the Code of Conduct is used more as a weapon of war than a way of maintaining good standards.

"That is the real reason for this media statement.  It is not so much an expression of my personal upset, real though that is, but rather a wider appeal for deputies and others to stop using the code of conduct as a means of attack.  If this trend towards aggressive and factional politics continues we will all come to regret it. 

"I am sorry if I have let my political mask slip and shown myself to be a human being with human emotions. Such weakness is atypical of me but I am probably unusually sensitised just now.  I will now put my game face back on and try not to ever show human frailty again."