New P&R Committee elected in Guernsey

Deputy Heidi Soulsby has been elected as the vice-president of the committee

Four new deputies have been elected to Guernsey’s Policy and Resources (P&R) Committee.

Deputies Heidi Soulsby, Jonathan Le Tocq, Bob Murray and John Gollop have all been elected.

Three of them were nominated by new P&R President Deputy Lyndon Trott, after he was elected as the island's new top politician on Wednesday.

Deputy Gavin St Pier, the former chief minister, Deputies Sasha Kazantseva-Miller, Simon Vermeulen and Charles Parkinson were also proposed for a seat.

Jonathan Le Tocq is one of four members of the new P&R Committee

Mr Trott said his biggest priority for the start of his leadership of P&R was to foster "some unity" within the States.

Mrs Soulsby has been elected as the vice-president of the committee, meaning she will also be known as the deputy chief minister.

She said being elected into P&R had been “a very strange and long-winded process”.

“We need to bring back some unity, I think we need to build bridges, for the good of the island - the divisions haven’t been good.”

Bob Murray was also elected into the new P&R Committee

With 17 months until the next general election, Mrs Soulsby said there was a need for the new P&R to focus on key issues including building more housing.

The previous P&R president Mr Le Tocq has been re-elected as the committee’s external relations lead.

John Gollop said he did not expect to be elected into the new P&R Committee

The island’s longest serving current politician Mr Gollop said he was surprised he managed to get a seat on the committee as he “expected to come bottom”.

He was nominated by Deputy Peter Ferbrache - the former chief minister .

Mr Gollop said: “I hope I can be a unifying candidate as most of those put up were from one side of the States and I think I come from both wings.”

Mr Gollop was the only successful candidate in the election to P&R who was not nominated by Mr Trott.