Electoral reform – will we get a say?

Sunday 19 February 2017

A leading Jersey politician wants to make sure the public has its say - again - before any changes are made to the Island’s electoral system.

Although States members approved a raft of changes earlier this month Senator Lyndon Farnham thinks there should be a another referendum to make sure the changes have popular support.

Under the approved changes the States will now be made up of eight Senators elected on an Island-wide basis, 12 parish Constables, and 28 deputies. The big change is that rather than being elected on a parish and district basis as has been traditionally been the case, Deputies will be elected in six ‘super constituencies’.

There’ll be two St Helier constituencies; the East – which will include Grouville, St Clement, and St Martin; the North – St Martin and Trinity; the West – St John, St Lawrence, St Mary and St Ouen; and the South – St Brelade and St Peter.

Senator Farnham believes carrying out the referendum is likely to cost around £30,000. Since it’s hoped to have the changes come into force around October or November the referendum will have to be held before then. If the referendum is to go ahead it’ll first need States approval.

The Island has only held a handful of referenda and many critics claim they’ve been a waste of time. One asked Islanders whether we should change to European time, another asked questions about electoral reform. Neither was binding. The time referendum was overwhelming rejected, and the States didn’t carry out the popular choice in the electoral reform referendum.

Once again Senator Farnham’s referendum wouldn’t be binding.

Despite a high level of cynicism, Senator Farnham is upbeat and says in his report recommending the referendum: “Whilst it could be argued that we do not have a good track record with referenda in recent years, we must not let this compromise our judgement on their legitimate use in the future. And we must certainly never ignore the result of a referendum in the future.”