Electoral reform consultation (FOI)

Produced by the Freedom of Information office
Authored by Government of Jersey on behalf of the States Greffe and published on 31 January 2020.
Prepared internally, no external costs.

Request

Proposition P126/2019 due for debate 4 February 2020 on Page 4 Paragraph 4 States that:

These proposals have been revised in response to widespread consultation. An “Electoral Reform Explained” presentation was made by the Privileges and Procedures Committee (PPC) subcommittee in all Parish Halls. Independently moderated qualitative and quantitative surveying was commissioned with emphatic results:

• 89% support for the PPC proposals from those attending the 6 focus group sessions

• 74% support from those completing a survey, online, in hard copy or questioned in the street.

Please advise:

A

Members of the six focus groups mentioned, how the participants were selected and from what branches of Jersey society they were drawn, for example if they were mostly politicians or other groups.

B

Who carried out the 'focus groups' and secondly, how the online surveys were advised to the public of Jersey, how many responded and how many were 'questioned in the street' and in what context were the questions put.

Response

A and B

The qualitative and quantitative work was undertaken for the Privileges and Procedures Committee by 4insight, who were appointed following a tender process.

A qualitative methodology (focus groups) was first used to gain in-depth knowledge of perceptions and views of Islanders, helping to provide insight as well inform the design of the quantitative phase (survey).

The demographics of participants (age, gender, Parish, employment and so on) in both the focus groups and surveys are already in the public domain and can be found in the report accompanying P.126/2019:

Electoral Reform 2020

Invitations to participate in this independent research were developed and sent by 4insight to their representative panel of over 2,800 Islanders.

When potential respondents contacted 4insight, they were screened to obtain a mix of demographics such as age, gender, Parish lived in, employment status, income level, ethnicities, Jersey born vs non-Jersey born and family situations and so on.

States members past and present, as well as anyone from the market research sector, political bloggers and members of the media were all excluded from participation, together with their immediate family.

Six focus groups were held in October 2019.

In total 47 respondents took part. Each focus group lasted 90-100 minutes and was conducted to an agreed discussion / topic guide with some stimulus materials to inform, after elicitation of awareness levels and perceptions, prior to decision making. Some projective techniques were included to explore emotional views in addition to the rational, eg first words association. All groups were recorded and professionally analysed.

A survey structured questionnaire was then designed and agreed, aiming to quantify opinions held by Islanders. It was programmed into 4insight’s professional software, then the survey link was soft launched to 10-15 people verifying its operation before a full launch to the 4insight representative panel of 2,800 people. The online survey was optimised for easy completion on smartphone, tablet, laptop and PC.

Random selection CAPI street interviews, (121) were additionally conducted by interviewers to survey any demographic gaps and those less digitally confident. This mixed methodology improved the survey robustness.

A mix of socio-demographics was achieved with a total of 614 responses being captured. After data cleaning (removing repeat responses or partial completion), a total of 529 data cases were recorded and analysed in the phase two survey.

This response has been issued on behalf of the States Greffe. The States Greffe is responsible for the information held by (and on behalf of) both itself and the States Assembly. Neither the States Assembly nor the States Greffe form part of the Government of Jersey and the Government was not involved either in the examination and retrieval of any information required for this response, nor in the drafting of the response itself.