Work on setting up a Bailiwick Commission has started with people in Alderney given an insight into how it might affect their community.

A public meeting last week saw Jo Reeve BEM and Amy Collis, who both work for the States of Guernsey, travel to Alderney to discuss how a Bailiwick Commission might work.

They answered questions posed by the public at the Island Hall, alongside President of the States of Alderney, William Tate.

Some of the questions concerned the existing and future financial arrangements between Guernsey and Alderney, and examples of how such Commissions have worked elsewhere.

Pictured (l-r): William Tate; President of the States of Alderney, Amy Collis; External and Constitutional Relations Officer for the States of Guernsey, and Jo Reeve BEM; Director of International Relations and Constitutional Affairs for the States of Guernsey.

The idea of setting up a Bailiwick Commission came from the former Policy and Resources Committee in Guernsey.

It came out of the ongoing discussions around fixing Alderney’s runway, with costs escalating and the States of Guernsey capping the budget for the project.

Those talks led to a planned review of the wider relationship between Guernsey and Alderney, with the former P&R saying earlier this year: “the relationship between Guernsey and Alderney should be resettled to ensure that both sides have a clear and shared understanding of the parameters and reasonable expectations”. 

P&R says to work out the details – including whether the 1948 Agreement remains fit for purpose – it wanted to set up “a constitutional commission to consider objectively the relationships between Guernsey and Alderney and how they could work together better in the future”.

Sark was also brought into the talks, notably around the proposed loan of £1.5million from Guernsey to Chief Pleas to buy Sark Electricity Ltd.

Pictured: Sark wants to buy SEL, but a condition of borrowing money from Guernsey to do so would bring Sark into a new Bailiwick Commission.

One of the conditions that P&R put on Guernsey lending Sark the money was that the smaller island will be involved in the Bailiwick Commission.

At the time the loan was agreed, the States of Guernsey was in the early stages of setting up the Commission.

That work took a step forward last week with the public meeting in Alderney, and further meetings planned for each of the islands.

Mr Reeve told the Alderney audience that the idea of reviewing the islands’ internal relationship is not a new one – and its hoped the Bailiwick can do this for itself rather than having the work forced on it by outside influences.

“The idea around it came a couple of years ago in the previous term (of the States of Guernsey),” explained Mr Reeve.

“There was some discussion around renegotiating the relationship, and I think that’s quite difficult to do, and there was some discussion around having a Royal Commission coming in to look at the relationship or something like that, and those discussions worried me a little bit. We quite fiercely defend our autonomy. We’re not part of the UK. We like to be in charge of our own domestic affairs, and the idea of someone imposing some sort of review on us is something we ought to try and avoid, and we can sort our own problems.”

Mr Reeve said the Commission won’t force any changes on to any of the islands.

Instead, he sees it as a way for all of the islands to work together.

“It’s not about imposing change,” he said.

“It’s about inviting discussion to allow a consensual process to discuss change. Change might not be accepted, and we might not come out with ideas that are fully accepted but it’s a really good chance to try and reset that political engagement and to try and understand people’s expectations and to understand the issues.”