AN ITEM in the Billet d’Etat today confirms a Guernsey Press article of 29 July that there will be no  freedom of information law in the island, certainly in the short term.

Instead, there will be some sort of evolution towards more open government and greater public access to information via what the Policy Council calls a ‘Guernsey solution’.

It has come up with this following an ‘informal’ email survey of States members asking whether the island should adopt a UK-style, legislation backed approach.

Since, by then, deputies had been subject to presentations arranged by the council which highlighted the cost and the bureaucracy of the UK system, the outcome was unsurprising.

Having obtained what under recently approved good governance rules ought to be an informed and transparent decision but, more importantly, the one that it wanted, the council brought in a former high-ranking Ministry of Justice official to prepare a report that would deliver that Guernsey solution.

It is not explicitly stated in the Billet today what the terms of reference were that Ms Belinda Crowe worked under. Some of those whom she interviewed, however, were surprised by the vehemence with which she insisted that no right of appeal should be provided for those refused requests for information.

According to the Policy Council, the aim of the report is ‘to develop a high level of information strategy for the States of Guernsey, recommendations for increasing openness and the systems, processes and culture to support the strategy’.

In other words, nothing is going to happen quickly.

Ms Crowe favoured creating a climate in which FoI was unnecessary, which is certainly an aspirational objective.

While many islanders believe strongly that there should be some formal arrangements on freedom of information, most would probably agree with a pragmatic, low-cost approach.

However, it is hard to see how any system that leaves it to government to decide what to release can have much credibility.