People have their say on 2020 election

Monday 07 October 2019

More than a thousand respondents to a States survey have had their say on how next year's first-ever islandwide election should work.

The States Assembly & Constitution Committee has released a report summarising the findings of the questionnaire, which Committee President Neil Inder said had been a great success.

“The States’ Assembly & Constitution Committee launched a questionnaire for six weeks over the summer to help it understand how the public would like to receive information from the States of Guernsey about candidates in the lead up to the General Election in June 2020," he said. 

"We saw a fantastic response with 1,186 people returning the questionnaire. We are grateful to everyone who took the time to complete the questionnaire and give additional feedback.”

Pictured: The majority of respondents wanted to receive a summary of each candidate's manifesto, rather than the whole document. 

The Committee sought feedback on ideas such as producing a 'combined manifesto booklet' that incorporates all of the candidate manifestos into one document, the creation of video and audio clips for candidates to broadcast their message and allowing people to submit questions to candidates online.

Some of the key results were that:

• 82% wanted to see individual pages for each candidate on the States website with a copy of their full manifesto, photo and contact details
• Just over half of respondents wanted to see a short video clip of each candidate at around 2 – 3 minutes in length and for such videos to be able to be shared via social media.
• An even split between those who want a hard copy of a combined manifesto sent to their home and those who would be happy to view it electronically
• Respondents suggested various ways of meeting candidates, including hustings held, drop-ins, “speed-dating”-type meetings and roadshows.

Deputy Neil Inder, said: “We are currently finalising the Committee’s next policy letter on the General Election and the consultation responses will help inform the Committee of what it will propose. These proposals will be presented to the States of Deliberation by the end of 2019”.