ONE of the odder reports in the latest Billet d’Etat is from the States Assembly and Constitution Committee, which brings together a rag-bag of disjointed proposals in part helping States members understand what they mean when they vote ‘to note’ an item.

While clarifying that doing so ‘shall be construed as a neutral motion, neither implying assent for, nor disapproval of, the contents of the report concerned’ may be necessary for deputies, much else in Sacc’s paper is more questionable.

In that category is a proposal that ministers henceforth be called presidents and that the chief minister should become the president of the Policy Council.

The committee’s reasoning is that it had ‘a number’ (unspecified) of representations on this and that the title minister is inaccurate because Guernsey has no executive government.

Even if correct, that has been the case since 2004 and what to call heads of departments was the subject of intense debate, as was the decision to have a senior deputy who visibly would lead the island in international matters.

What Sacc’s proposals would do at a stroke is to demote the island’s first among equals because everyone would become ‘president’ and thus equal among equals.

Islanders might not think these things matter much but Sacc is mischief-making on a grand scale. This is not about rectifying some significant problem in the machinery of government but a rather more malign attempt at levelling members and trying to hold back any future reform of the States system.

Every member of the States Assembly and Constitution Committee signed a letter in this newspaper seeking to block any move towards executive government and this latest development – which might be seen as an abuse of their committee role – appears tailor-made to assist their cause.

That is questionable in itself. The consequences of their plot being approved are worse. Unnecessary legislation will be needed, extra printing required and, since no start date is specified, a further debate needed to decide whether a less-than-pressing change is introduced mid-term or delayed until 2012 when the new States is elected.

This is petty politics at its worst.