In a few weeks you’ll have waded through 80-odd manifestos, made your selections and hopefully created a functioning States. And here, says Richard Digard, is a simple way to see whether your representatives are really working for you

AT TODAY’S prices you, as grateful taxpayers and electors, will have given John Gollop a total of around £1,035,000 – yes, more than a million quid – over the 23 years he’s been a People’s Deputy and representing your interests in the island and States of Guernsey.

And before you (and he) throw up your hands in horror and say that’s a grossly misleading figure, yes, of course it is. The weasel words are ‘at today’s prices’, so even as Father of the House because he’s been there so long, he’s not received anything like that. 

But the point remains, deputies are expensive even when they’re not buying hundreds of 25mph road signs to frustrate your drive home. Currently, it’s around £2m. a year, £165,000 a month or £5,500 a day for your political representation while, in turn, they busily oversee the expected government expenditure of £1.8m. a day this year alone, on your behalf.

So it follows you have every right and expectation to know what they’re doing in your name, right? It’s tempting at this stage to say wrong, but the pedants out there might point to the States members’ code of conduct and say it speaks about accountability and openness and transparency.

Well yes, it does. But the code itself is a positive witches’ cauldron of weasel words – we now know thanks to a diligent member of the public sitting in the gallery how deputies interpret ‘due priority’ to attending States meetings – and is more proscriptive than enabling.

So what is fair to say is how deputies choose to engage with you over the next four years and, ahem, openly and transparently justify their £50k a year, is entirely up to them. So here we go, Digard’s handy dipstick test by which you can measure whether they’re doing it well and contentiously or actually closet members of the fag break brigade (Hon. Pres., Deputy Indolent*).  

First up, they should have a lot to keep you informed about. Their remit covers making laws, challenging States’ decisions and actions; acting directly on your behalf and raising constituency issues in the Chamber or with departments; sitting on committees, where much of the daily grind is actually played out; and evolving policy. Government Work Plan anyone?

True, you’ve rarely heard a word from the current lot since they were elected. But as a diligent elector you should be looking for candidates who at outset are seeking to establish a direct and personal relationship with you. When, for instance, did you last hear from a deputy explaining what they’ve been up to?

So next, does their candidate entry in the ‘manifesto of death’ coming to you on a low-loader clearly set how they intend to represent you and how you can easily make contact with them? Does it provide any clue as to how they intend communicating with you after the election? Signing up for their email newsletter, for instance (hardcopies for the PC-challenged)? Are they on social media and cheerfully outlining their priorities, values, and explaining why they’re taking a particular stance on particular topics? 

I’m especially interested in how candidates and members intend listening to islanders. Some years ago, a heavyweight deputy from St Peter Port had a late-night call from someone whose dustbin hadn’t been emptied. ‘Call Tony Webber (then also a deputy); he cares about those things,’ came the crisp response.

More recently, States members justify their stance on things by the number of phone calls or emails they have/haven’t received. Sorry, leaving it to lobby groups or chance just isn’t good enough. Anyone with a phone can seek views, create surveys or even (gasp!) ask the 25k members of the Guernsey People Have Your Say Facebook group what they think (response guaranteed!).

Time was, deputies used to hold surgeries, listening forums where people could have their say and provide some honest feedback on how they felt ‘their’ deputies were performing and representing them. That, alas, appears to have been another casualty of island-wide voting, but there’s nothing to stop new States members from actively seeking your views in future – drop-ins or outreach sessions, perhaps?

How to let people down
Which brings me on to the next point of elector engagement – how to let people down. 

Be honest, as a deputy you’re more likely to do, or not do, stuff which hacks people off than win islanders’ admiration. So what’s the strategy for dealing with those whose wants or needs haven’t been met?

Managing expectations will help you as a deputy to build credibility. If this Assembly had said, ‘sorry, we’re just sh*t at doing stuff’ I bet taxpayers would hate them less. As it is, islanders now expect to be let down at every turn – and are rarely disappointed. 

So how about a bit of post-event feedback? Trying to follow what’s really happening in States debates is difficult if a complex topic is debated over a number of days and is subject to various amendments. What’s really happened? You’ll never know from the States’ own website. 

So an email or blog piece explaining what happened, how you voted and why would be very helpful. So, too, would be an explainer: what this means to us as islanders and what you as a deputy intend to do following the outcome. Accept the majority decision or, as this is a major point of principle, keep making the case for change?

You’ll gather from this that I regard good communications from States members as pretty essential. And the reasons are simple. Having been elected as a People’s Deputy (there’s a clue in that title), their sworn duty is ‘well and faithfully’ to to act in the public interest and conscientiously to represent the interests of those who they have been elected to serve.

While the need for diligent public service has never been stronger, the link between deputies and the people they serve has never been weaker. Loss of smaller constituencies means States members are more removed from those they represent and less accountable too. 

Many like it that way. Who wants the great unwashed asking impertinent questions about what they’ve done, where they’ve been and how much it cost? Which is why a candidate setting out clearly how they intend engaging with voters to plug that gap would be a breath of fresh air.

So, if candidates want to pass the deputy dipstick test they know what to do. 

*This is not a real deputy. Any resemblance to an actual States member is purely coincidental.