On 5 September 2025 I wrote a review of my ‘loophole campaign’ and it was kindly published by the Bailiwick Express.

Given its unusual nature a single review would not suffice and, as the title of the first review suggested, it was the first in a trilogy.

The campaign has changed me, I am not who I once was, explanations are needed.

So we come to part two where fair is foul and foul is fair.

Some have called it the greatest campaign that the world of politics has ever seen. I have become the first ever political candidate to do precisely what they set out to do in their manifesto: a world first really.

In addition, as set out in part 1, I have become the first person in Guernsey to ever assume the office of anti-Deputy, as I promised I would.

The campaign was ahead of its time really, prescient in many ways. Who will care to admit that the vision and the spirit of the manifesto remains as thematically relevant today as the day it was published. 

Inconvenient but true nonetheless.

For example, I said we would have 37 active Deputies, and 1 anti-Deputy… the elephant in the room. Given how some were so opposed to the idea of my campaign going forward, it’s more than a little ironic, don’t you think?

However none of that is what part 2 is specifically about. My loophole campaign ultimately involved the most unlikely of events you could imagine. A story so unique to Guernsey, much like the Loophole campaign, and it belongs to Guernsey. It is a democratic miracle that only I am in a position to tell and so, in the interests of Honesty and Openness, that’s what I must do, even though I only exist now as the Spectre of a dead campaign.

Part 1 omitted an important element: the situation surrounding Deputy number 38: The Last Deputy.

Given the context of the Loophole proposal, the Last Deputy position in the 2025 Guernsey election was always going to be more lucky than usual. However the way the story unfolded is truly extraordinary, but to tell the story first we must go to the beginning of the campaign.

From the very outset the Loophole campaign was always a daring highwire act, at all times its fate hung on the edge of a knife. Stray but a little and it would fall, and so I used social media to test the water and different ways to express it. What would work? I used those signals and various pieces of feedback to adapt the campaign before the guerrilla campaign could begin, fishing for the right way to frame it.

The timing of the launch of the campaign was no accident either, I had waited 18 months to deliver it, the idea was dangerous – it could have gone very badly in the wrong hands. So I opted to launch the campaign on 11 April 2025, too close to the election for anarchist copycats, but far enough in advance of the nomination period that I could gauge sentiment, test public reaction. I was not attached to any outcome. I left all available options open.

However, after the launch of the Loophole campaign, the signs that it was going to do well were quickly very clear to see. In a place like Guernsey, it doesn’t take long for ripples on the water to start coming back your way and I didn’t have to go out of my way to feel them either. Little second-hand anecdotes began to drift past, conversations overheard in restaurants or the workplace. People talking about the idea, people supporting the idea. Those were just small sample sizes but the implications were clear: extended to the wider population, people were going to vote for the idea in numbers!

It had even achieved recognition in international media; I received a phone call from a relative at a local nursing home; my campaign appeared as a cartoon in the June 2025 edition of Oldie Magazine. I had reached the big time!

However there was always the other side of the campaign, the most significant risk to the endeavour; there were inevitably going to be some who would be completely unamused by the prospect. 

At first glance you would never believe that such a campaign could even be possible. Some vested interests were going to react quite negatively and I was going to be pursued by all and sundry for this campaign either way.

I didn’t choose to find the loophole though, the loophole chose me. We are not put on this earth to rest on our laurels and choose the easy option at every turn. Sometimes we must put ourselves through trials, this is the way. I calculated the risk-reward, measured the probabilities, assessed all the outs, considered all the signals. All signs said proceed and so I took a step in faith onto the tightrope to undertake this tactical operation.

That said, I could feel the lurking doom approaching after I launched the campaign. Nothing explicit, no email correspondence, no private messages, no warnings, just the ominous silence and lurking shadow of the octopus stalking its curious prey. That’s why, on May the Fourth, I published a long Facebook post to preemptively tell my side of the story, just in case someone tried to press me to withdraw. 

My instincts proved correct and on 7 May (now-) Deputy Hansmann Rouxel (‘DHR’) had a letter appear in the Guernsey Press challenging my campaign. I had spent many months, however, researching and preparing the Loophole campaign and, through her letter, with an array of invalid assertions, had run headlong into a barrier of spears. Her letter warranted a strong rebuttal, which I wrote that very weekend, Liberation Day weekend as it happened.

The rebuttal letter brought to mind the infamous events of 1879 and the conduct of Lord Chelmsford in the Natal Colony at Isandhlwana. Chelmsford led the British forces against the Zulu Impi of King Cetshwayo who, armed with only spears and local tactical knowledge, were hopelessly outmatched against the might of the British Empire. However Chelmsford, in his complacence, failed to do any reconnaissance or make any appropriate defense of his camp. 

History would remember the outcome at the Battle of Isandhlwana where the Zulu nation would surprise everyone by coming out of nowhere to inflict a famous defeat upon the British. It would find Chelmsford floundering in its aftermath. I too had DHR thoroughly defeated by my diligence and my letter in response would be most comprehensive.

Only a few days later however, the candidate nomination window opened and, before I had a chance to deliver my decisive rebuttal letter, civil servants were already primed to intervene.

I would withdraw.

In the end, my letter was only published after the election. What I thought would be my victory was not to be.

Continuing the Anglo-Zulu War theme, Chelmsford would have the last laugh. Subsequent to his defeat at the Battle of Isandhlwana, through the cunning use of the Victoria Cross, he would elevate the heroics at the Battle of Rorke’s Drift into the legend it is today. In doing so, buying himself only just enough time to win ultimate victory over the Zulus so he could include that on his LinkedIn profile and CV.

Similarly, DHR would also have the last laugh, ultimately being elected as Deputy, before my rebuttal letter was even able to be published, and becoming President of the States Assembly and Constitution Committee, presiding over the closure of the Loophole in due course.

The octopus had remorselessly devoured me whole.

However now we have come to the point where this trilogy takes a TURN, because before you ever undertake a risky highwire act, first you must prepare. Know where your safety nets are, take out appropriate insurance.

“The jester could speak truth to power. He could make the king laugh, and tell him the truth without getting his head chopped off. Now that is risk management.” 

Deputy hansmann rouxel

This is only the first half of part 2 of the campaign review trilogy, part 2A

What will 2B have in store?

That is the question.

Valar Dohaeris and Best Regards,

anti-Deputy Reed

Vale