Hopes for a healthy future

Deputy Anne Pryke, the candidate nominated by Chief Minister Terry Le Sueur, was ultimately successful after two rounds of voting. As well as receiving deserved congratulations on her victory, she will be wished well by all those who have been eager to see an injection of level-headedness and common sense into an area of

politics which has been mired in a range of controversies in recent months.

Deputy Pryke has the advantage of

already having served as an Assistant Minister, deputising for Senator Freddie Cohen at Environment. Moreover, as a former nurse, she will also be returning to familiar territory.

She will, however, have to hit the ground

running if she is to make the necessary early impact and manage the restoration of our health service’s badly damaged morale.

In addition, there is much work to be done to ensure that Health and Social Services departments are resourced so that they can be fully effective at a time when there are bound to be huge pressures on funding.

Another of the candidates, former Health Minister Jim Perchard, who resigned so recently over his unseemly spat with Senator Stuart Syvret, would dearly have liked to take up the burden of his old departments once more. However, his candidacy was without doubt a step too far too soon – though he is likely to find future opportunities to demonstrate that he has talents that merit being fully employed.

Yet another candidate, Deputy Geoff Southern, is a politician whose thoughts turn first to the underdog, which is not an unwelcome credential for anyone in charge of health and social issues. But, as he

will realise, the odds were stacked against him in spite of this because his social

conscience is, in the minds of many inside and outside the House, tainted by his

determination to be a particularly active member of the unofficial opposition in the Assembly rather than a seeker of balance and consensus.

Meanwhile, with the benefit of hindsight, Deputes Collin Egré and Paul Le Claire probably wish they had not gone to the trouble of standing. The votes they secured showed that any confidence that they might have had in their ability to fill what is bound to be a deeply challenging role was clearly not shared to any significant degree by their political colleagues.