By Mike Beaugeard
During many years of observing and participating in political campaigns, by far the most common refrain I’ve heard while canvassing on doorsteps has been ‘We only ever see you at election time.’ However, if the number of declared candidates indicated by the Flow.Je website is anything to go by, the good citizens of Jersey may well have to resort to a new, and infinitely more depressing mantra – ‘We never even see you at election time.’
I need to add a significant caveat at this point. Nominations for election candidates did not close until late last Friday afternoon, and the official list will not be released until Wednesday. It is still possible that a sudden late rush of candidates who have kept their applications extremely close to their chests until the last possible moment may yet be revealed. I certainly hope so because, as it stands, the list I am looking at right now represents a disaster for local democracy.
If trends on various social media are to be taken seriously – and the past decade has seen a marked shift in the transference and subsequent influence of political commentary by journalists, politicians and the general public from traditional outlets such as newspapers and pamphlets to digital formats via desktop, tablet and mobile phone screens – then there has never been more outrage and displeasure expressed at our Jersey government than during these most recent few years. One would presume from this that the electorate were ripe for change, and just itching to give some of our unfortunate incumbent politicians a hefty metaphorical kicking.
But here’s the thing – and I make no apology for stating what to some is blindingly obvious, though is often forgotten in the heat of outrage and recrimination. You cannot get rid of someone you no longer wish to remain in government unless you replace that person with someone else. And you can only do that if there are a sufficient number of candidates to offer you that option. What is scaring the bejesus out of me at the moment – and it certainly should be concentrating the minds of those of you who value local democracy in this Island – is how disturbingly meagre that current list of candidates for Deputy appears to be, particularly in some districts. Grouville, for example, has three seats available and, as of Sunday evening, only three candidates listed.
The situation is even worse among candidates for parish Connétables, which currently stands at 14 people vying for 12 seats. Again, I must stress that these figures may not offer the complete picture, but there will need to have been a late surge of seismic proportions for the situation to improve to anywhere near acceptable levels.
Now, I’m the sort of person who would far rather vote in favour of something for positive reasons, be that a proposition or an election candidate, rather than voting against something or someone simply for the sake of it. But, in order to be able to do that in a calm, thoughtful and pragmatic manner, I need to be offered a reasonable choice.
I know that the changes that have been made between our last batch of elections and this one were well-intended, and certainly there needed to be a major rearrangement of the ratio between population and representation which has now happened with the formation of new districts rather than the simple parish system of bygone years. However, there are now significant anomalies within the current set-up which could skew a number of outcomes in ways which, and let’s not make any bones about it, are contrary to both the intent and the wishes that such changes were meant to bring about.
Frankly, I can see a number of candidates winning seats either with an absurdly low number of votes or almost by default. If that happens, I don’t know how these successful Deputies – or Constables – will be able to accept their pay with a straight face. Actually, I do know since, for many of them, that pay amounts to little more than loose change in their already ample bank accounts. For some, it is the getting there that matters, not the means by which that is achieved. If they can manage it because their opponents were few in number, and scarcely credible, then so much the better.
For the rest of us, though, we may have to spend the next four years being governed by a quorum of individuals selected as a consequence of our Island’s traditionally-apathetic electorate having been offered an equally apathetic slate of candidates – hardly a recipe for ‘Government Of The People, By The People, For The People’, I’d have thought, if I can borrow a slice of optimistic populism from our cousins across the pond.
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As a young man, Mike Beaugeard served in the army. He has also been a musician, Hi-Fi business owner, Conservative local politician, property manager, and security officer. Now retired, he is a keen amateur photographer. He describes himself as a staunch advocate of the Plain English Campaign.
