Thanks to the good people of St Saviour, I was elected Deputy for the past political term, and have now decided to put my name forward for the recently re-established role of Senator.
When I stood for election four years ago, I made a manifesto pledge to ‘seek whatever position of responsibility that I could obtain’.
I was fortunate enough to be elected, then be appointed Minister for Infrastructure. As is commonly known, I was very critical of the government that I had joined and after 18 months, decided to propose a vote of no confidence – which was carried.
Thereafter, I moved to Health, but retained political responsibility for the hospital. I was then joined by three excellent Assistant Ministers, Deputies Andy Howell, Rose Binet and Barbara Ward. All three have worked tirelessly and collaboratively and helped make a huge difference in setting the Health Service on the right track for the future.
During that time, we were able to persuade the Assembly that the Service has been underfunded, repeatedly, and that specific areas of great importance, like system-wide digitisation and ‘prevention first’, had been neglected.
This was subsequently addressed with an appreciable funding increase in the recent budget.
Previously centralised functions like Finance, HR, Digital, Procurement and the Ambulance Service have now been returned to the Health Service, creating a more integrated operation. And much progress has also been made to improve Medicines regulation.
Our Team has also designed and appointed a Health Partnership Board to bring the various sectors of health together (Hospital, GPs, Health Charities, Home Care, Care Homes, Pharmacy etc) allowing all parties to contribute to the design and function of the entire service.
Work on the new Hospital has progressed well, with site preparation continuing whilst we finalise details for the signing of a construction contract. Hopefully, quite soon.
Throughout this political term, I’ve learned a great deal about the functions of government, its strengths and weaknesses, and the areas of work that we should, and should not be doing. I also have some clear ideas of where, and how, money could be saved – and how the system could be made more efficient.
I believe our island has become complacent. The political system has spent far too much time focused on spending money and far too little on creating it. This has to change.
We need to promote ourselves more assertively – and have something more attractive, more coherent, and more efficient to offer islanders and, importantly, to attract new business. If elected, I would, again ‘like to seek whatever position of responsibility I could obtain’ to drive much needed improvements to the entire function of government.
Thank-you.
Names of Proposers and Seconders
- Michael John Talibard
- Luke Canavan
- Geoffrey John Eden
- Richard Thomas Perchard
- Gilbert Paul Riou
- Jean Lelliott
- Nigel Minihane
- Heidi Andrea Susanne McGinty
- Clifford Chipperfield
- Graham John Bisson