Report criticises Government's pandemic prep and transparency

Wednesday 17 March 2021

A new report has criticised the Government for "inadequate" transparency in its approach to making decisions about covid rules, and for failing to update its pandemic strategy for more than six years.

Published today, the Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel's review also hits out at discrepancies between Government decisions and STAC advice and delays in bringing forward new covid legislation.

"Transparency in relation to STAC minutes has not been adequate," the report reads. "The minutes were not made available to the public by Government and a proposition had to be brought forward to the States Assembly to prompt this action.

"Although these are now being published, there is a significant time delay. For example, the minutes for September to December were published in mid-January.”

Pictured: Senator Kristina Moore said the need for clarity from the Government was "crucial."

The publishing of STAC minutes has been a contentious issue ever since the Assembly voted to regularly put them in the public domain - in August last year, the Government was accused of "ignoring the will" of the Assembly when it did not publish the minutes by the given deadline.

In the new report, the panel noted that "advice given through STAC was not always followed by Ministers and without further transparency of decision-making bodies (Council of Ministers, Competent Authorities and Emergency Council) it will remain unclear on what basis decisions were made.”

An example of a disagreement between STAC advice and the Government's decision making was revealed earlier this year, when STAC minutes showed that Dr Ivan Muscat did not agree with the decision to relax the rules over what made a jurisdiction a 'green zone' last summer.

The panel also remarked on the fact that the The Channel Islands Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Strategy, which provides a plan for how the island should respond to a serious new virus or disease threat, had "not been updated for several years despite an exercise being conducted in November 2019" - as revealed by Express in April last year.

Pictured: The Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Strategy has not been updated since 2014.

The panel also pointed out that "the Government knew as early as July that mandatory face covering may have been required in the winter, or if infection rates grew”, and that "a proposition to introduce regulations concerning mandatory face covering took at least 54 working days to produce following Scientific and Technology Advisory Cell agreement on their necessity."

Indeed, minutes reported on by Express showed that STAC in fact wanted masks to be mandatory from October.

When the legislation did eventually come through in December, the Chief Minister stated that it "was a difficulty in getting the law drafting actually written in the right way," which caused the 54 day wait.

In terms of funding for these provisions, the Panel highlighted a lack of overall holistic budgeting, saying that "covid-19 costs were accounted on a case by case basis and no budgeting or forecasts have appeared in any covid-19 Strategies."

As part of its recommendations the report published yesterday, the panel has said that the Chief Minister "should provide clarity on the timeline for a revised Channel Islands Pandemic Strategy to the States Assembly", as well as clarifying the "alignment between the covid-19 Strategies and the Channel Islands Pandemic Strategy."

Pictured: The Panel encouraged the Chief Minister to provide clarity on when they can expect a revised Pandemic Strategy.

Furthermore, they emphasised that "decision making bodies such as the Council of Ministers, Competent Authorities Ministers and Emergencies Council should always follow advice of the STAC, publicly identify where decisions differ from that advice and clarify why decisions have differed from that advice, with immediate effect," as well as publishing any minutes "within two weeks of the meeting taking place."

They have also suggested an independent survey be undertaken to "to gauge [islanders'] perceptions of the covid-19 response and ongoing strategy in order to better inform decision-making and policy development."

On the findings, Panel Chair Senator Kristina Moore said: “The need for the Government to provide clarity and transparency in decision-making related to COVID-19 is crucial, particularly when it comes to the minutes of decision-making bodies.  

"Whilst the Panel appreciates the pace at which the Government has had to respond to this pandemic, the Panel’s recommendations should inform the ongoing response and that of future crises. 

"The Panel will continue monitoring the effectiveness of Government decision-making and evaluate the potential long-term societal impacts of these decisions in its next report.”