Party leader's demise sets the tone for grim night for Reform Jersey - Jersey Evening Post
by Tom Innes · Jersey Evening PostPosted inNews
Party leader’s demise sets the tone for grim night for Reform Jersey
by Tom Innes 8 June 2026
Share this:
GLUM faces and closed doors were in evidence at Reform Jersey’s election HQ as the news that party leader Sam Mézec had lost his place in the Assembly was confirmed, followed by Deputy Rob Ward falling short in his bid to become Constable of St Helier.
Confirmation that Deputy Mézec was out after 12 years in the Assembly came at around 2.30am, casting a major question mark over the party that he co-founded in 2014.
Three of the party’s Deputy candidates – Tom Coles, Montfort Tadier and Beatriz Porée – were re-elected, but several others, most notably Deputy Ward, fell by the wayside, while others waited to learn their fate later on Monday.
Deputy Kovacs also lost her St Saviour seat in one of the final results called on Monday morning.
Attempts by the media to speak to the party leader, or Reform candidates, at the Royal Hotel in David Place were unsuccessful – a big contrast to the celebrations of four years ago when the party doubled its representation in the Assembly from five to ten.
Although some of Reform Jersey’s candidates will not learn their fate until counting resumed after the overnight pause, the party leader’s defeat was a bodyblow.
It brought back memories of 2018, when Deputy Mézec trailed in the polls throughout the evening before a surge in the Reform heartland of St Helier took him up from 11th position to take the eighth and final Senatorial spot – just 123 clear of his nearest rival, Moz Scott.
Four years later, Deputy Mézec had too big a hill to climb when it came to St Helier, and did not even have the consolation prize of finishing top of the poll in the capital, with Deputy Helen Miles finishing around 200 clear of his tally of 3,137.
Although it fielded candidates in St Clement, St Saviour, St Brelade and St Mary, St Ouen and St Peter, the party’s strongest focus came in the three St Helier districts.
Having previously held three of the four seats in St Helier South, Reform’s representation shrank to two-thirds of the three available seats this year, with Deputies Tom Coles and Beatriz Porée being re-elected but newcomer Carla Jardim falling just short: just 27 votes short of Deputy Porée.
St Clement had been identified as a potential ground for the party to increase its representation, but Mick Robbins and Noah Jervis finished sixth and seventh in the seven-horse race, almost 700 votes short of being elected.
There was also disappointment in St Mary, St Ouen and St Peter, where Helen Evans finished in sixth and last place.
Originally set up as a pressure group to lobby for electoral reform in the run-up to the 2013 referendum, Reform Jersey came to prominence in March 2014 when co-founders Nick Le Cornu and Deputy Mézec were elected – the latter being one of the youngest elected politicians at just 23 – as Deputies for St Helier districts one and two respectively following by-elections resulting from Trevor and Shona Pitman losing their seats after being declared bankrupt.
Reform Jersey was officially registered as a political party in July 2014, but within two months Mr Le Cornu had been expelled in disgrace after posting distasteful social media messages about his Assembly colleague Deputy Kristina Moore. The following month, the party saw three candidates elected at the island-wide elections, with Deputy Mézec joined by Deputies Geoff Southern and Montfort Tadier, while five candidates were unsuccessful.
In May 2018, Reform fielded candidates for 15 of the 49 vacant positions in the Assembly. The party increased its tally of elected Members from three to five, with Deputies Southern, Mézec and Tadier joined by newcomers Rob Ward and Carina Alves.
Four years later and Reform really showed it had arrived as a force to be reckoned with, doubling its representation in the States Chamber as its five sitting Members were re-elected and joined by an equal-sized cohort of fresh faces, with Deputies Beatriz Porée, Raluca Kovacs, Tom Coles, Catherine Curtis and Lyndsay Feltham being sworn in on 27 June. The party leader was elected as Senator Mézec, scraping in to the eighth and final Island-wide spot by just 123 votes ahead of rival Moz Scott and subsequently serving as Children’s and Housing Minister under Chief Minister John Le Fondré.
When Chief Minister Kristina Moore was ousted in January 2022 through a vote of no confidence, Deputy Mézec put himself forward as a candidate for Chief Minister. The party leader did not attract any support from outside his party, dropping out of the contest after the first round, with Deputy Lyndon Farnham then being elected in the second round having indicated he would offer places to Reform in his Council of Ministers.
Three Reform candidates were subsequently elected to the top table: Deputy Mézec as Housing Minister, Deputy Ward for Education and Deputy Feltham for Social Security.
Related
Read the latest free supplements
Read the Homelife, Connect and a whole host of other subjects like ranging from cycling to travel.
View all our latest supplements now >