Next Chief Minister?

[SleepyJoe]

12 minutes ago, Max Power said:

Joe, you and that Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah lunatic seem obsessed with having a female CM, irrespective of any track record at all?

Mrs Caine has an excellent track record in my book

[Declan]

6 minutes ago, Max Power said:

Joe, you and that Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah lunatic seem obsessed with having a female CM, irrespective of any track record at all?

It would be nice female if MHKs had been given the opportunity to get that track record during the previous house. Quayle chose one of the boys every time he promoted someone to minister level. Then says his successor must be an existing minister. 

 

[Max Power]

8 minutes ago, quilp said:

Barber has experience, and the gumption to speak up. 

She has, but has she got leadership qualities? She may have, but they are unproven under pressure, much like most of the HoK. At least Cannan and Allinson have led a department and are a known quantity. 

[SleepyJoe]

Doesn't necessarily make them suitable for the top job

Most of our better Keys members - with the exception of Mr Thomas - are women IMHO

It was a great shame to see Mr Shimmins leave Tynwald

Cannan on the other hand is in my opinion a vacuous autocrat totally devoid of any policy other than the honeyed words of his own rhetoric

[Max Power]

3 minutes ago, SleepyJoe said:

Mrs Caine has an excellent track record in my book

As an MHK, yes.

2 minutes ago, Declan said:

It would be nice female if MHKs had been given the opportunity to get that track record during the previous house. Quayle chose one of the boys every time he promoted someone to minister level. Then says his successor must be an existing minister. 

 

I don't disagree, but he didn't have any experienced females to choose from. Allinson as a newbie but a professional man, was drafted in after the reshuffle following Bill Malarky's passing. Ashford, who had political experience at DBC, was brought in after the Kate Beecroft fiasco.

It does make sense that a previous minister should be CM, how else would their suitability be assessed?

[SleepyJoe]

By a legitimate poll of the voting public 

[SleepyJoe]

It's them that pays & them that should decide

[Zarley]

12 minutes ago, Declan said:

It would be nice female if MHKs had been given the opportunity to get that track record during the previous house. Quayle chose one of the boys every time he promoted someone to minister level. Then says his successor must be an existing minister. 

 

It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Cannan, should he become CM, also chooses only men as ministers. Alinson would be much more likely to include women. 

[Roger Mexico]

32 minutes ago, Gladys said:

How states view religion as a good thing and one to regard as the highest authority is beyond me.  Religion is man-made and a lot of men are taking full advantage of the privileges it confers, vis child abuse, financial irregularity and war mongering. 

Well quite, but those things are capable of flourishing under the most militant atheists as well.   Patriarchy doesn't always require a man in a funny hat.

I'm actually very sceptical about a lot of militant atheists, especially on the Right. Most Left-wingers tend to look at religion as a distracting palliative - "The heart of a heartless world" to quote Marx - but for too many on the Right they just replace God with something equally imaginary, like the 'invisible hand' of the market.  Which they think is equally infallible.  Some of course just transfer the omniscience onto themselves. 

[Amadeus]

I've added a poll because why not. 

[Max Power]

11 minutes ago, SleepyJoe said:

By a legitimate poll of the voting public 

 

10 minutes ago, SleepyJoe said:

It's them that pays & them that should decide

We have just had one popularity contest judged by the public, now you want another?

[SleepyJoe]

Not for CM we haven't

[asitis]

If we really want change the MHK's should not elect either of these two, they went along with HQ and the dross of the past 5 years, at least CT spoke up , he would be my choice.

[Roger Mexico]

37 minutes ago, 747-400 said:

Frankly so much valuble was wasted in the last session with Qs that could easily have been answered elsewhere. 

Use Question time for things that really matter!

There was some of that - though Departments (as with FoI requests) are entitled to point out the information is publicly available and do no more[1].  There have been a fair few reply which consist of "Have you looked of our website?".

A more serious criticism is that MHKs aren't always very good at following up and publicising the answers they do get and using them to get changes.  Some do, often asking a lot of related questions as they try to track down information that is being hidden.  But too often you come across replies that shouldn't be ignored but have been.  Of course the media bears a lot of responsibility for this situation as well.

The situation with Oral Questions is a bit different as the answer is often known to the questioner (like the old legal maxim that you should never ask a question in Court when you don't know what the response should be).  In this case it's often more about pressing for action or pointing out things that have gone wrong.

 

[1]  Occasionally this is abused.  I remember Edge asking about public sector housing and being told that the information was all in the Tynwald Library (ie not online).  This might have been technically true, but it would have been scattered over dozens of documents and the DoI must have the information on a simple spreadsheet that would have been clearer for the public (if possibly embarrassing for them).

[Declan]

1 hour ago, Max Power said:

As an MHK, yes.

I don't disagree, but he didn't have any experienced females to choose from. Allinson as a newbie but a professional man, was drafted in after the reshuffle following Bill Malarky's passing. Ashford, who had political experience at DBC, was brought in after the Kate Beecroft fiasco.

It does make sense that a previous minister should be CM, how else would their suitability be assessed?

And Baker's promotion? Or Boot, Crageen and Harmer staying in COMIN for all his term? What leadership skills had Quayle displayed prior to becoming CM - he'd been a disastrous health minister. 

Anyway it should be the policies and team around them that's more important than "having run a department" for CM. 

It seems there's some Quayle-defined non-existent rules that benefit people like Quayle ...

• Ministers must have served in Tynwald before. 
• CM must have been a minister.

Edited October 6, 2021 by Declan