Elections: Let’s filter out the no-hoper candidates
Monday 21st June 2010, 3:00PM BST.
From Mark Renouf.
I WAS fascinated to hear Francis Le Gresley, upon winning his Senatorial seat, declaring that his major concern was to investigate the disconnect between the local population and politicians.
It is no coincidence that the CTV correspondent at the Town Hall reported on Twitter the same evening that she had just overheard a sitting States member declaring that the hustings were a waste of time.
I grew up in a household debating politics, helping in campaigns, and am probably unusually interested in the subject. I used to attend the Senatorial hustings with a sense of keen anticipation, because they are the only live session where voters can assess the candidate’s ability to respond ‘on the hoof’.
I did not bother to attend the hustings this year, as we have far too many candidates sitting at each Senatorial election and they are now pointless – what can you learn from a candidate in a one or two minute answer in response to a handful of questions in one evening? Very little.
The wide range of candidates in elections is corroding democracy in Jersey and needs to be changed urgently. The hustings have become largely tedious and irrelevant. As voters, we continually face a field which includes too many ‘time wasters’, who keep putting themselves forward despite their repeated past failures, presumably on the basis that if you keep standing, one day you will eventually get elected.
If I have one wish before the next election, it is that the States ensure there is a ‘filter’ to reduce the number of Senatorial candidates on the Island-wide mandate to a more manageable level.
We either need: a sufficiently high deposit to discourage those who achieve less than a certain proportion of the vote, as in the UK; some sort of ‘primary’ election, as in the US, perhaps held at a series of Parish meetings; or only to allow existing States members to stand as Senators, thus forcing newcomers to start in a parish election as a Deputy or a Constable.
My preference is probably for the last suggestion, as it used to be considered appropriate to start as a Deputy and graduate on to being a Senator having established a track record.
It would also revitalise the importance of parish elections and reduce the number of uncontested elections. You never know, we might also see the reappearance of the more entertaining side of electioneering, such as lorries with bands playing circulating the parishes.
Please, States members, lets change this before the ‘general’ election in 16 months time presents a ridiculously large field of candidates.
I am interested in politics and consider it my public duty to vote, and if even I am becoming disillusioned, what hope is there to engage other members of the electorate?
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l would agree a deposit is a good idea but what makes a good Senator is another matter. You see the problem has always been the voter not the candidate. The voter always gets who they want but continually they make the wrong choice. I could explain why but this is not the venue for that.
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Mr Renouf,
Twenty years ago people in the big island to the north of us regarded the Green party as a bunch of cranks who stood not a celluloid rat in hell’s chance of ever gaining parliamentary representation: the Liberal Democrats had about 20 MPs and were regarded as a marginal grouping in a two-party landscape. Four weeks ago the first Green MP entered Westminster and the Lib Dems became partners in government.
So who in Jersey has the right to sit in judgment as to who is a no-hoper? Not I: not any member of the States – and assuredly, not you.
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Mac@2 – The person who has every right to judge who is a no-hoper is the voter, and they did precisely that. As for Gino Risoli’s lament that the voters keep choosing the wrong people – they didn’t. They voted for who they wanted and didn’t vote for who they didn’t want. That includes you. We call it democracy.
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Mr. Risoli, that’s called democracy.
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Surely you have to stand in the first place to even start getting known!
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Folks, l was agreeing with you. The voter always get what they want but l have an idea you lot are still not happy with your lot. I just happen to know why the electorate keeps repeating their error. The present problems in jersey cannot be resolved by policy. The sooner you understand this the less pain you will have to endure. But folks pain has a positive side, it is how one learns.
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“The voter always get what they want” says Gino.
Well, I voted and didn’t get what I wanted.
Perhaps you mean “The majority of the few who voted got what they want”?
A prospective senator would also do well not to address the electorate as “You lot”. Maybe that’s how the States view the rest of us and Gino is practising getting into role.
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Euan Mee@3: Actually, it doesn’t include me, because I do not have the right to a vote.
And it does not invalidate the point that telling people they can’t stand for election is the first step down a slippery slope to dictatorship.
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Sorry, l did not mean to offend, getting such a low vote l felt some what offended, but that is just ego on my part.
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Instead of traipsing around the parish halls, candidates should take part in a televised debate similar to the one we just saw for the UK general election. CTV needs to wake up and start serving the island. Their output these days is limited to mediocre news and puffin! Come on CTV, live televised debates please with online interaction etc. This is the 21st century!
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Leah Holmes 5.
Good comment.
Mac 8.
Too true.
Gino Risoli 9.
It’s not the winning, it’s the taking part that counts. It’s one of the oldest clichés in the book, my father used to whisper it to me each time I walked away from the running track disheartened and disillusioned.
It takes fortitude, commitment and tenacity to reach one’s goal and at least you attempted to reach yours…far too many people give up before they even start. Probably due to fear, because in politics it’s more like – “It’s not the winning, it’s the taking your opponents apart that counts!”
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Requiring a deposit is a bad idea.
I thought the cornerstone of democracy was that anyone could stand. As soon as money gets involved corruption follows with sponsors looking after their own interest. This is why there should also be a cap on election spending and full transparency on who the sponsors are. We have enough curtain twitchers on this site alone convinced there is corruption in the States and this idea stretches it to the electoral process as well.
I’d much rather see many candidates on a level playing field than a few privileged ones. Let the voters ‘filter’ out who they don’t want on election day.
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The real problem with Jersey politics is the fact that you have to form the equivalent of a National Government with most of the offices that entails, Education, Health, Social Security, Law and Order etc – from a small population.
Hence the quality & subsequent performance of your Senators is low.
Industry/finance companies can (and of course do) select the right candidate from outside these shores
The Jersey voter has a high chance of choosing a no-hoper when the candidates on offer are in the main not fit for office.
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‘Industry/finance companies can (and of course do) select the right candidate from outside these shores.’
Obviously you do not know about the no hopers that were impossible to sack in London so were ‘promoted’ to Jersey where they could not do any harm!
The States has similar responsibilities to a county council with quite a bit more leeway on how they run things. Most of them are decent individuals and would make an OK county councillor, a few would make a good MP.
Jersey does not produce or need world statesmen and women.
Sometimes I think the only world class thing about some parts of island life is the delusions of the individuals concerned!
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#9 Gino, at least you made the effort to stand.
There are ways (other than money) to make sure candidates are committed, and Joker is correct to point out one of the major flaws in requiring a deposit.
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There is no comparison between running the average States Department and the corresponding department in even a small country.
The Jersey Health Minister is in charge of one hospital and a few clinics, Home Affairs has a force of a hundred odd officers and a tiny prison, Education has a score or so of schools and most really important issues such as GCSE examinations, etc are decided outside the island.
The really bizarre thing about the whole set up is that the senior hired help of our little Trumpington on Sea are paid a lot more than if they worked for a leading council in the UK and on a par with the most senior civil servants in the UK.
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Winning is over rated. You cannot have a first without a second. The importance of winning is a fault line in society. Everything in life is connected. Where the world is now is where it has always been, the survival of the fittest, which has little to do with intelegence. To evole we either get educated or through experience, the lattef requires pain.
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