REFORM Jersey now has co-leaders after a vote was tied at Thursday’s AGM to choose a successor to Sam Mézec, who was ousted from the States Assembly last month.
Deputies Lyndsay Feltham and Montfort Tadier will work together to lead the party in the short term until another election is arranged.
Mr Mézec lost his parliamentary seat in the 7 June election after more than a decade as a States Member – finishing tenth in the Senatorial race, with nine seats up for grabs.
Overall, the party had a disappointing election: as well as Mr Mézec, Reform Jersey lost senior member Rob Ward, who came second in a five-way battle to become St Helier Constable, as well as St Saviour Deputy Raluca Kovacs.
Overall, the party’s total number of seats in the Assembly fell from to ten to seven.
Deputies Feltham and Tadier were the only two Reform members to throw their hat in the ring to replace Mr Mézec. On Thursday, they each addressed the party membership and took questions before a secret ballot was held.
Both candidates received exactly the same number of votes. The party does not publicise the number of members it has.
First elected in 2022, Deputy Feltham was Social Security Minister in the last political term under Chief Minister Lyndon Farnham. Deputy Tadier has been a States Member since 2008 and has been both an assistant minister and senior scrutineer.
Party chair Helen Evans said: “While this tied result leading to no conclusive outcome is not something we had anticipated and leaves us in a situation, for the time being, of interim leadership arrangements, it also reflects the considerable strength of the party in that we have two highly capable members of the parliamentary party who are prepared to take on the role of party leader and who both have the support of a substantial number of party members.”
Dr Evans added that, under the terms of the party’s constitution, Deputy Feltham – who was deputy leader – had been acting interim leader since the election of Members to the States Assembly.
She said that Deputy Tadier will now work closely with Deputy Feltham as a co-leader and together they would make arrangements to hold another leadership election.
Although pre-dating the rebranding of the Nigel Farage-led Reform UK, which sits at the other end of the political spectrum to Reform Jersey, the local party is now set to change its name.
At the AGM, members voted in favour of a motion by former election candidate Nigel Jones requiring there to be a consultation on a change of party name and a special meeting to consider this by 31 October.
Dr Evans said: ‘I was really heartened to see that, despite our disappointing overall result in the June election, the party remains strong with a committed membership and members who are keen to get involved in the running of the party to ensure it continues its work towards creating a society that works for all including the poorest and most disadvantaged.
“Given the ever-increasing national media coverage of Nigel Farage’s party, it is clear now that we do need to change our name and we are now bound by the motion passed at this evening’s AGM to take action on that by the end of October.”
At the AGM, Dr Evans was re-elected as party chair, David Rotherham as secretary and Mericia Andrade as treasurer, all unopposed. A further ten party members were elected to its executive committee.
