THE political resignation has, with regret, moved on. In the old days it was a lot more upfront: you got caught doing something naughty, you held your hand up and you went, never to be heard of again. The modern resignation is different.

Nowadays, you get caught doing something naughty, you deny it and then say the press made it up. You admit nothing but go anyway, saying that you don’t want your non-existent wrong-doing to ‘distract’ your bosses and colleagues – and you come back 18 months later.

Last week’s departure of the Housing Minister was the very model of a modern resignation.
The bare facts are these: Terry Le Main had been getting support in his election campaigns since 1978 from a guy running an advertising agency who ‘sponsored’ him, and provided services at cost price.

When a branch of the department that he ran prosecuted the sponsor, Senator Le Main wrote to the prosecutors several times to urge them to stop, and then pleaded with the sentencing court to be lenient.

As the facts began to emerge, the Senator’s initial protests that he wasn’t friends with the guy who had been helping him out since 1978, along with his ill-advised challenge to the Crown Advocate who first raised the matter in court, started to look a little less than wise.

So, then came the resignation letter, which ticked all of the modern boxes.
No hint of any kind of admission of guilt? Check.

The vague suggestion that if you had done anything wrong, it was because you’re too good a person? Check.

Loads of stuff about your fabulous track record? Check.

Some noble rubbish about going to save your mates some bother? Check.

Dark rumblings about the media? Check.

Later in the week a separate document emerged which, you might think, did a better job of articulating the former minister’s real feelings about the events leading to his resignation. It opened with the phrase ‘I have been done up like a kipper … political assassination …’ which, if not classic parliamentary language is at least vintage Le Main.

The key point to all this is that at no point in the modern resignation must you take responsibility for anything.

You really can’t, because there is always a way back if you don’t.
It’s a trend common in politics generally, particularly here – I dimly remember hearing a minister say ‘I take full responsibility for this mistake by an officer in my department’, which struck me as an odd thing to say.

The same goes for States Members losing a debate – the modern trend is just to say simply that you never thought you’d win but were seeking to raise an issue publicly, on which basis you’ve succeeded.

And it comes up at election time. I remember one candidate blaming his lack of success on not getting his message across ‘for some reason’, as opposed to the unthinkable alternatives of problems with his track record or manifesto.

But that’s all in the past. By the time that this newspaper hits the streets there will be a new Housing Minister – presumably one of Senator Alan Breckon or Deputies Jackie Hilton or Sean Power.

The good news: all of them are good candidates who know a bit about the job through work in the department or on Scrutiny, and none of them is the type to get pushed around by anyone, and all of them take their work very seriously.

If something else good has come out of all of this, it’s that Deputy Geoff Southern will have been spared the work of preparing for his vote of no confidence.

Always a fan of efficiency, he simply switched his attentions to the Chief Minister, lodging a vote of no confidence in him instead.

A question about that leaps to mind: thinking about the balance in the House, about questions of credibility and about the alternative candidates, does the Deputy really, honestly think it will go through?

If he does, then you’ve got to question his judgment. If he doesn’t, then why is he doing it?
What possible reason would Senatorial by-election candidate Geoff Southern have for trying to grab an easy headline? I’m just saying I’m confused, that’s all.