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STATES OF JERSEY
AUDIT OF GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENT VACANCIES
Lodged au Greffe on 22nd September 2023 by Deputy M.B. Andrews of St Helier North Earliest date for debate: 17th October 2023
STATES GREFFE
2023 P.73
PROPOSITION
THE STATES are asked to decide whether they are of opinion to request the Chief Minister –
- to instruct all government departments to audit their current job vacancies and, by June 2024, identify those vacancies that can be removed as unnecessary to the functioning of departments, and the payroll reductions that would result from the removal of vacancies identified; and
- to report back to the Assembly, by July 2024, on the payroll expenditure savings across all government departments resulting from this audit.
DEPUTY M.B. ANDREWS OF ST. HELIER NORTH
REPORT
It was an election pledge of mine to address the executive branch of government, and this is something I still intend to do. With the size of the public sector continuing to grow and the number of vacancies increasing too, I believe something ought to be done to address this.
As the quantitative data shows, the Government of Jersey's headcount increased by 1,115 employees across the period of 2018 to 2022. However, interims, contractors, agency staff and zero-hour staff are excluded from these figures and therefore the amount of wage labour employed to deliver services on behalf of the Government of Jersey across the period is actually higher wq.14-2023.pdf (gov.je).
During the same period, payroll expenditure across all Ministerial departments increased from £310,070,000 in 2018 to £380,213,000 in 2021 wq.43-2023.pdf (gov.je).
Quantitative data shows during the period of 2018 to 2022 the number of employees employed across six different salary bands across the Government of Jersey. With the lowest income salary band of £0 - £19,999 seeing an increase in headcount from 49 employees in 2018 to 810 employees in 2022 which accounts for the biggest increase in headcount across the six salary bands. The number of employees receiving between £20,000 - £39,999 increased from 3,098 employees to 3,110 employees and the number of employees earning between £40,000 - £59,999 decreased from 2,881 employees to 2,751 employees. The number of employees earning between £60,000 - £79,999 increased from 543 employees to 968 employees. In addition to this, the number of employees receiving a salary between £80,000 - £99,999 increased from 200 to 279 employees and the number of employees earning over £100,000 also increased across the same period from 166 employees to 209 employees.
What furthermore concerns me is the increase in the number of vacancies across all government departments. As the quantitative data shows there were 671 vacancies across all government departments as shown in the response to my written question answered on the 27th of February 2023 [wq.62-2023.pdf (gov.je)] but the number of vacancies increased to 949 vacancies as shown in the response to my written question dated 17th of July 2023 [wq.310-2023.pdf (gov.je)].
With the headcount of employees increasing by 1,115 between 2018 and 2022 and the number of vacancies increasing by 322.6 between October 2018 [626.4 total vacancies - WQ.201/2018] and July 2023 [949 total vacancies WQ.310/2023] if all positions were
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filled that would be a total headcount increase of 1,437.6 over the period which demonstrates an exponential growth.
I, like many members of the public, am becoming dissatisfied with the increasing size of the public sector along with the growing wage bill.
Despite the fact that the States Assembly approved p.107-2022.pdf (gov.je), it will take time for this data to influence payroll expenditure savings, as decisions involving payroll expenditure savings need to be taken without impacting the provision of public services.
I believe where vacancies are concerned prospective payroll expenditure savings can be made, and therefore, I am asking the Chief Minister to request an audit of current vacancies to identify and remove those vacancies which are unnecessary to the functions of all government departments before June 2024, and to also report the aggregate number of payroll expenditure savings, if any, that can be made by removing vacancies identified in the audit across all government departments before July 2024.
It must also be recognised with the number of vacancies changing on a daily basis special consideration must be given for the creation of new vacancies during a period when payroll reductions are being prioritised.
Financial and staffing implications
There will be a staffing requirement to reduce the number of vacancies across each government department. Prospective payroll expenditure savings could be made pending on vacancies being identified and reduced too.