By-election watch: the score so far

It's three and a half weeks until the nominations meeting at the Town Hall to see which fine and friendly faces from the local community will be contesting the seat previously held by the late Richard Rondel, and, with today's rag giving us a short update on the folks that've put themselves forward, I thought I'd take stock and do a little who's who of who we've got so far.

First up, we've got established townie, Procureur du Bien Public, fluent Russian speaker, Jèrriais activist, winner of the 2007 and 2008 Fête Nouormande prizes for the best short story in Norman and mastermind of the St. Helier cycling strategy,  52-year-old Mr. Geraint Jennings. A former member of the Jersey Green Party (along with Stuart Syvret), Jennings has been trying without success to gain a seat in the States for the last 27 years, including at the last election in May. Running on a platform of "balance of healthy environment, strong economy, and everyday opportunity" most of his manifesto is that same recycled "population, environment, business" shtick that even the best candidates (which Geraint, in this case, very well might be) pack their manifestos with. I'm attracted to him, then, for two reasons.

Firstly, unlike far too many people, he actually takes Jèrriais seriously. He speaks Jèrriais, he's an active member of the Société Jersiaise and he writes in Jèrriais for both the rag and his own website. We live at a critical juncture in terms of Jèrriais policy - how seriously the government takes conservation in the next few years will make the difference between extinction and renaissance, and, for the sake of our cultural independence, renaissance MUST be the road we go down.

Secondly, he wants to devolve by-law powers to a reformed municipal administration in town. I bang on about this a lot, but giving parish administrations powers to actually do something meaningful (as opposed to what we have now, where in most parishes a small clique of grandees sitting around discussing potholes) is critical to reviving the parish system and giving a new lease of life to parish democracy - voting for people who take this stuff seriously is important.

So, that's Geraint. If you don't like Reform, or they don't put up a candidate, probably vote for him.

Next up is designated Shenton-Troy family sockpuppet, finance sector suck-up and incoherent moron, Gordon George Troy. He also stood in May in the senatorials, coming a resounding 13th place (just above Bernard Cribbins look-alike Frank Luce, greasy-spoon cafe owner Gino "put all employment laws into the dustbin" Risoli, and twin clowns Phil Maguire and Stevie Ocean) - a less than surprising result, considering his god-awful performance at the hustings. Troy's manifesto from May is Tel Boy-levels of incoherent and meaningless - either his writing skills are akin to a twelve-year-old or he viewed the voters with such contempt that he didn't bother to write anything substantial - and it's very clear from reading it that he comes from a much older breed of Jersey politician. It doesn't contain a single sentence of policy on economic diversification, child abuse, rents, or any other issue affecting Jersey today - Troy instead chooses to bang on about how amazing the finance industry is, and about his "30 year's (sic) business experience".

There's not really much more to say about Troy. He's self-evidently an out-of-touch idiot who wouldn't know a real political issue if it slapped him in the face and who has been put up to standing by Ben or whichever other particular made man of the Shenton-Troy mafia.

That brings us to the third man - or rather, woman - planning to contest the seat, and it's a name we haven't heard in the political sphere; Andrea Talibard-Mallet. Her only real claim to fame is bungling a chance to win £58,000 back when she was on the BBC version of "1 vs 100" in 2006. Given that her main agenda seems to be, er, copying off the dead ("The late Deputy Richard Rondel is such a great loss and his shoes are impossible to fill, but I am determined to see his vision for the regeneration of the district and St Helier come to fruition, as well as being a voice for the people of Jersey on so many issues that we face together."), I'm not exactly bowled over, but I guess we wait and see what she's got to offer. She can't be a complete idiot, right? Right?

Still, there's an elephant in the room.

Who is Reform Jersey planning on standing in St. Helier No. 3/4?

In May, they put up three candidates - Anne Southern, Mary Ayling-Philip and Julian Rogers, coming 7th, 8th and 9th respectively out of a ten-horse race. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, but they'll likely be dealing with a smaller pool of candidates this time, and they've got the pick of the litter when it comes to deciding which one of their 18 candidates from last time round will be contesting the by-election. Reform's campaign suffered the last time around because the political right was able to construct a narrative of a bunch of hangers-on who only stood for Reform because they wanted support from a party - whether that's true or not, it's an image problem that Reform must avoid this time round. It's critical that the person put up to contest this thing is a principled socialist.

I guess we'll see in the coming weeks.