Islanders Association starts to put "meat on the bones"

Thursday 12 April 2018

The Deputies behind the Islanders Association have unveiled their mission, values and objectives, and what exactly they want to achieve with the idea of the group, during an exclusive interview with Express.

They said it was in response to the constructive criticism and suggestions from its supporters that they have received following their public meetings.

The listed policy objectives are personal ones of its members so far - they still want the final decision to fall to Association members.

And its mission: Developing a decisive, effective and efficient government rooted in and driven by our community.

One of the main points of contention with the Association was its plan to create its policy and directives with members of the public when they joined. People said they wanted a clear policy outline so they could know whether or not they were fit to join. But the aim of the Association is to have as broad a membership base as possible and to properly represent the public rather than just the founding deputies, Deputy Carl Meerveld, one of the founding three, said.

"It's a chicken and egg situation, that is why we originally decided to let the membership decide when it had formed, but people have asked for more clarity, so we have set out some points that we support and feel are essential to the future of the island," he said.

"We are going to release a draft constitution in the next few weeks as well that will hopefully further add to clearing up what the association is hoping to be, that is then going to be changed, approved and ratified by our members at our first convention. But at the core of it all is the need for the States to be more efficient. As Deputies, we see day to day the problems with the system, and it is our obligation as elected officials - we feel - to try and make the system better for those who elected us, that is what the core of the Association is at the moment."

The Deputies made clear that the emphasis of the Association is to make the States more efficient ahead of any particular policy. To do that, they plan to involve the public much more than the current system of government does and also to change the nature of the island's general elections, to remove some of the "time wasting" from the assembly.

"It's people, that's how we are going to do it," Deputy Peter Ferbrache said.

"We want to change the nature of the elections we have by putting forward candidates with clear policy objectives and even higher level implementation plans," Deputy Meerveld added.

"If we can do this - and come up with those plans with the help of our members - then we can change elections from popularity contests to policy debate. Then when deputies go to the States, the expectation of the public can be when are they going to do a particular thing, not how, and implementation plans can already be to hand, to speed the entire process up."

What is the Islanders Association Deputies' problem with the current States?

In brief: it is speed and efficiency. What do they say it needs more of: focus.

"We have been in the assembly for two years now, and what have we achieved?" Deputy Ferbrache asked, "at this point the die are cast, and there is only so much more that can happen in the next two years before the election."

"We want the States to really grapple with issues and come up with solutions faster - not spend two days debating when I should be allowed to light a bonfire." 

The Deputies also said one of their concerns was the island's economy. The policy objectives they have produced are similar to those in the Policy & Resources Committee's midterm financial plan, but they said they had concerns over whether that plan would even come to fruition.

"It is not so much the policy and ideas of the current assembly that we have any problems with at all - in fact on that front, we are all quite different - Deputy Meerveld wanted three schools, I wanted two, that isn't the point. We don't have confidence the plans will ever come from paper to reality. 

"We are not saying the positive economic statistics Deputy St Pier has spoken about aren't true, if he says we have a surplus we have a surplus, and while we ourselves are not starting to doom say, we have to ask is it sustainable going forwards? That is where we are concerned. We have been talking about diversifying our economy for 30, 40, even 50 years, but we have never actually done so."

Deputy Meerveld continued: "If we do not start addressing some of the issues very soon our economy will go downhill and we will become increasingly irrelevant on the world stage. We are a small jurisdiction and we should be able to move on a dime if needed."

Pictured: The launch of the Islanders Association 

Going forwards:

Ultimately, the Islanders Associations' mission is to develop a decisive, effective and efficient government. And it was launched due to frustration at the new form of government's inability to act and efficiently implement decisions.

Looking forward, its first annual convention will be held at the start of summer, where the draft constitution will be approved and its policy objectives totally decided. At that convention, leadership will be decided, and Deptuies Mooney, Meerveld and Ferbrache confirmed they will put themselves forwards for that leadership. They also confirmed they have now agreed to assume leadership of the Association until that point.  

It plans to host its convention every year, and during an election year, a number of months before the election, in order to chose its candidates and prepare their campaigns. 

"The time it has taken us to get this from concept to having meetings hopefully proves to people that when you have people like us, this is how things can be done," Deputy Meerveld said.

"It's how things should and would be done," Deputy Ferbrache added.

So far, the Islanders Association has raised just over 10% of its fundraising stretch target of £150,000. The Deputies said that was enough for them to launch, but the overall target would allow them to get up and running much faster and hopefully field around 20 candidates in the 2020 election.