Attempt to delay housing committee debate

Debate on the creation of a Committee for Housing is currently scheduled to start at the States meeting on 4 September

Guernsey's top politicians have asked to delay a debate on the creation of a housing committee.

Chief Minister Lyndon Trott argued the debate on the proposals from six deputies to create a new committee should happen once the 2025 budget had been decided.

Three committees have expressed concerns about the creation of a new committee for housing.

States members will discuss whether to delay debate on a new housing committee until December, next month.

Deputy Sasha Kazantseva-Miller who is leading the move to create a Committee for Housing said she would back the move to delay debate.

Proposals for Guernsey's 2025 budget will be published in October, with a debate scheduled to start 5 November.

The Policy and Resources Committee (P&R) has set out in its argument to delay debate, that creating a new housing committee would cost money and could lead to more staff being employed.

It argued the States needed to be fully appraised of the island's financial position before this debate takes place.

Concerned committees

Vice-President of the Development and Planning Authority (DPA) Andy Taylor wrote in a letter to P&R that he was concerned what the creation of a new housing committee would mean for the work of the DPA.

He argued if the new committee started to work on planning policy "it would raise serious issues of conflict of interest".

Employment and Social Security President Peter Roffey has argued the money that would be spent on this new committee would be better off being spent on working towards the Guernsey Housing Plan.

That is something Environment and Infrastructure President Lindsay de Sausmarez agrees with.

In her letter to P&R she argued "any financial resource that would be required in the establishment of the Committee for Housing, and indeed in the administration of the additional political body, would be more effective if directed towards providing additional resources for delivery of workstreams within the Guernsey Housing Plan".