TOWARDS the end of Friday, the Policy Council released a two-page statement clarifying its Billet d’Etat report on how to progress the findings of the tribunal of inquiry into the airport firefighter dispute.

Dry it might have been – but the significance was great. Ministers had actually lost sight of the broad sweep of the tribunal findings in seeking to limit improvements to cross department corporate working to matters of industrial relations.

Feedback, in particular questions from this newspaper, demanded a reconsideration because the tribunal’s verdict could not have been clearer: ‘The failure to deal with the underlying problem, which led to the industrial action by the firefighters, stems from the system of government which does not  encourage either a corporate approach or collective responsibility. In our view there was a systemic failure to act in a corporate and strategic manner.’

As a result, the chief minister has now accepted those conclusions in their wider corporate context, ‘and I for one [am] committed to following them through’.

This has the potential to be a breakthrough moment and one that could make the executive versus consensus systems of government discussion yesterday’s argument.

The highly skilled tribunal panel focused on one point: how could a problem be allowed to escalate over the years to a full crisis that closed the airport and ultimately threatened the job of the chief minister and the stability of government? Where were the mechanisms to deal with what were effectively disagreements between departments and the remuneration committee?

In other words, who bangs heads together and restores order when things happen that are not in Guernsey’s wider interest and in what circumstances should such action be taken?

The floor of the Assembly is not necessarily the best forum, especially when time is pressing, and having to declare a full state of emergency just so procedure is satisfied is clearly inappropriate, especially if the aim is to prevent difficulties from becoming crises.

If members put aside prejudices about systems and powers and ministerial authority and see this for what it is – basic conflict resolution – Guernsey can finally start to move forward.