Gorst confirms he's going for third term as Chief Minister

Tuesday 06 March 2018

Jersey's Chief Minister, Senator Ian Gorst, has confirmed he will be standing again both as a Senator, and as Chief Minister - if successful, he says it will be his third, and last, term in the role.

Senator Gorst made the announcement this morning at a business event hosted by the Institute of Directors.

Senator Gorst used his speech this morning to set out his election manifesto ahead of the May vote; he tried to set an agenda about changing the way the States works, using the findings of the £23m Independent Jersey Care Inquiry as the key proof point of why reform needs to happen.

Senator Gorst has already been the island's top politician for six years, but used his presentation this morning to lambast the States system, saying that it was failing the island, that it was full of "fiefdoms", and so he would campaign on a 'change' platform:

"We are politicians, we are good at talking, we're not particularly good at doing, so we agree everything in principle but when it comes down to pressing the voting button and making the change, we always find a reason that it's too difficult. It's not good enough. We are letting islanders down, we are wasting money, we are working in a silo approach, I don't want to be evasive and talk about the way we are letting children down, as that's just one bit of it, that's surely bad enough, but actually you can transpose that across everything we do.

"24 procurement processes for the same piece of kit because every bit of the department wants to do their own thing? Your (IoD) members have been rightly criticising us for years, we are right now on the crux of making this change.

"This election is going to be about, I think, do we stick with the old way or do we work together for a better way?"

Pictured:  Senator Gorst speaking to the IoD this morning at the Pomme D'Or Hotel.

Senator Gorst is now coming to the end of two terms at the head of the island's government, but this morning he repeatedly came back to a central theme of reforming the way both States departments and the ministerial system work. Responding to questioner Brian Coutanche, who queried whether the island should fear the scale of reform he wanted, Senator Gorst responded: 

"The thing that is scary for me, the thing that is risky for us, is not changing - the world around us is changing at a phenomenal pace. The risk for us is not having the courage to make these changes. I think islanders understand that, I think islanders are fed up of the fact that it takes us so long to change.

"You see in your businesses the effect that change is having, so I actually see it through the other side of that lens."

This afternoon, States Chief Executive Charlie Parker is due to release more detail on plans to reform the public sector - so far, workforce modernisation plans have proven controversial with the unions, who are worried that many States workers are facing a real terms pay reduction over the next few years. 

Mr Parker was also on the platform at this morning's IoD event, and he warned that the current States workforce had a lot of highly paid roles, and so needed to change, as it was out of balance:

"Some of that will be about redeployment, and we are going to provide quite significant support for people. There will be an opportunity to change and re-train... There will be some changes in headcount - what that will ultimately create I don't know, because we are doing this in two phases, but there is no doubt we are going to have to deal with the fact that we have quite a high level of well-paid public servants, which are disproportionate to some of those at the lower end of the spectrum in terms of the work.

"So we've got to work out that imbalance in the organisation structure which is very much a pyramid, hierarchical structure, which is not necessarily where you want the business to be. 

"Longer-term we have to grow our own, so we don't have to go elsewhere for skills so much."

#MYIoDJsy again very impressed with the level of thought & commitment to the customer (us) from the new CEO @StatesofJersey . Really encouraging , good luck to him.

— Kevin Keen (@keenjersey) March 6, 2018

Mr Parker also dealt with a question on medium term financial planning, saying that some of the oversight and transparency in the current system was shocking:

"I'm very clear that we've got to be far, far, far stronger on our financial management, oversight and delivery of normal core business; if I told you some of the things we have found, I'd have some of you with your jaws on the floor, it is not good. So I don't think it is going to be difficult to improve the fiscal discipline, it's not going to difficult to improve the planning, and if you get the right people, or you develop in the way that you want to, you get much more transparency and accountability, and you start to see those numbers flow through in a very visible way."