The warning ministers cannot ignore

Saturday 3rd October 2009, 2:30PM BST.

MINISTERS were under mounting pressure yesterday to change the machinery of government – and to do so urgently.

All members of the G4 business groups – the Chamber of Commerce, Confederation of Guernsey Industry, Institute of Directors and Guernsey International Business Association – immediately reacted to calls during the Institute of Directors debate for a shake-up of the machinery of government.

The Chamber of Commerce and the Guernsey International Business Association went further, demanding the immediate commission of a ‘Harwood panel Mk2’ style review.

Chamber said any review’s recommendations must be binding.

‘Resolving the Wales Audit Office’s highlighted issues must be the single most important agenda item, recognising of course that Guernsey has many other critically important issues to also deal with.

However, this is a fundamental cornerstone that must be prioritised,’ said Chamber president Paul Luxon (pictured).

He said Chamber had met Chief Minister Lyndon Trott and Treasury minister Charles Parkinson to ask that refining the machinery of government be prioritised.

The Policy Council previously voted against debating the WAO report, although Deputy Trott this week called for the issue to be taken to the Assembly as soon as possible.

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1
Steven

October 3, 2009 at 10:07 pm

Chamber of Commerce, you really have got some nerve. Just where do you get off making demands on the peoples government.

And as if that’s not enough you’ve got the temerity to state that the results of your demands must be binding.

You really don’t understand Guernsey at all do you? You can respectfully request. But demands, you can take ‘em and shove ‘em.

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2
Dave Jones

October 4, 2009 at 11:06 am

I can tell you one thing and it is something I have not seen in the States for a long time and that is the coming together as a single voice of States members against the business community and the Guernsey Press’s hysterical call to change to Executive government. So if the press thinks that their campaign will unnerve the States, I can tell them it is having exactly the opposite effect. As I have said on another thread it is a bit rich for the banking community especially who have been collectively responsible for the financial mess the world finds itself in and many of those shouting the loudest in Guernsey for change are members of the same IOD that brought the threats we now face from organisations like the EU and the OECD because of their ineptitude. The business community want to take over our government, in order that they can manipulate what goes on, our government belongs to the people not bankers or the un-elected Guernsey Press.

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3
Horace

October 4, 2009 at 12:47 pm

It is understandable that those from the business community would like to impose a structure they know and understand upon us. For many of them their experience of how this Island is run is based on 5 or 10 or 15 years of exposure to our system. However many of them grew up with and were educated in another system and cannot see that what has to be put in place for 60 million people may not be the best system for 60 thousand people. They need to look at the results and compare those results with the examples they are holding up as models. I agree with Dave Jones that the examples set by a failed system and failed governments will not convert me to support adopting a similar system for Guernsey!

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4
arapaho

October 4, 2009 at 4:50 pm

To many, the mess we are in is obviously down to the present and past governments, we know this, and gone is the way of life which seems to have faded away in the name of progress , the financial cock up world wide was brought about by the same sort of moneygrabbers who are protesting about the way things are run now ,but with them the underlying thread is to make guernsey an even more profitable place to be ,(FOR THEM) these are people who have moved here from elsewhere ,(and brought seven or eight family members with them )and dont give a monkeys for what has gone on before ,or what should happen in the future ,just concerned about money ,to some of us ,even asking the present states to get things sorted isnt going to help as its the same bunch doing the fixing as did the breaking, theres more to running the island than making ourselves look squeaky clean in the world of business ,its about tradition ,memories, having a community with the right sort of people in it and having connections with a place (not the business kind) the family kind and having a bunch of non local business men in the states whose workload consists of meetings full of paraphrases like “reading from the same hymn sheet” “ticking the boxes” “keeping in the loop ” and “thinking outside the box” dosent inspire me with confidence because this is what they call work . guernsey is turning into one big office ,its not good and its not progress and its certainly not the community that it used to be ,and never will be again ,sadly missed by those who remember it R.I.P

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5
carts

October 5, 2009 at 8:50 am

David,
I’d be careful about making references to the Guernsey Press being “un-elected” or unrepresentative of the people, after all, it gets almost 16,000 island wide votes a day! ;)

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6
Edguet

October 9, 2009 at 7:09 pm

My parish Shore to Shore,gets to every single, householder in the Forest and St. Saviours.
As Dave Jones said, the Press should not be backing the hysterical call to executive government, by some of the people, who’s in my opinion, loyalty is not to the people of Guernsey.
In fact the Press should be a free voice of the Islanders, in the interests of the people.
They should not be voicing the interests, of a vociferous minority.
Good for you Dave keep up the defence of democracy, starting to like you alot again.

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7
Dave Jones

October 11, 2009 at 1:22 pm

Edguet
I thank you for your support on this issue, as Matt Fallaize (ex employee of the GP) says the Press have made no secret of the fact that its editor is driving the paper backing the call for cabinet government and it has done so for the last decade. In its editorial from time to time the Editor or deputy Editor will tell the reader that they are speaking on behalf of the people of Guernsey, absolute rot, they are sitting in their office putting forth their own personal views as to what they believe should happen. In fairness the editor said recently that he is not bothered about cabinet government, he merely wants a system that works, fair enough comment you might think, that is until you go back over what some of the papers editorials have said over a long period and you will see clearly he does back completely an executive system. richard and I enjoy batting this back and forth but there is a serious point to this and that is we do need a debate on the pro’s and cons of what will better serve this island in the coming months and years.

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