Second online poll to rate ministers - click here to have your say

Tuesday 24 May 2016

We've seen a u-turn over the People's Park and cuts announced to nursery funding since an online political poll revealed rock-bottom approval ratings for Jersey's politicians - so what do you think of our ministers now?

Independent campaign group change.je has launched its second online survey – asking key questions about individual ministers and politicians and how we rate them.

You can click on it here and have your say on how well you think politicians are doing their jobs now and this time campaigners have not only singled out the Chief Minister and Treasury Minister who rated unfavourably in the last one but also Senator Zoe Cameron after widespread criticism of her lack of attendance in the House.

Change.je founder Christian May said: “This is the second quarterly opinion poll produced by change.je, which we hope will help us identify trends in approval ratings for certain States Members and the way that the States Assembly and Council of Ministers are doing their jobs.

“This poll not only asks respondents to give their view on the members of the Council of Ministers, but has been tailored to allow them to rate their own Parish or District representatives; both Constables and Deputies."

Change.je are repeating the surveys every quarter to monitor trends as ministers’ ratings go up and down. The last damning opinion poll showed our top ministerial team had work to do to please the electorate, recording disapproval ratings of up to 62%.

Treasury Minister Alan Maclean was rated the least popular Minister and Chief Minister Ian Gorst scored a -48% unfavourability rating.

Just three of 16 politicians tested in the independent survey recorded favourable ratings – St Helier Constable Simon Crowcroft was easily the most popular, with a +26% favourability, followed by Reform Jersey’s Sam Mezec (+6%) and Home Affairs Minister Kristina Moore (+1%).

Mr May said: “In addition, with exactly two years until the next General Election, the poll asks respondents to rank the importance of a series of measures that have been proposed to reform the States; from the removal of the Bailiff as speaker to a return to the Committee system.

“We will be producing a new change.je website in short order to publicise the results and provide a record of all the polls conducted by change.je.”