States Meeting Transcript - 30/03/2011

STATES OF JERSEY OFFICIAL REPORT WEDNESDAY, 30th MARCH 2011

PUBLIC BUSINESS – resumption ...............................................................4

1. Salaries over £100,000: notification to States Assembly (P.30/2011) - as amended.....4

1.1 Deputy S. Power of St. Brelade : .........................................................4

1. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire of St. Helier : ...................................................6
2. Deputy A.E. Jeune :......................................................................8
3. Deputy M. Tadier of St. Brelade:........................................................9
4. Senator S.C. Ferguson:.................................................................10
5. Deputy T.M. Pitman of St. Helier:......................................................12
6. Connétable M.K. Jackson of St. Brelade:...............................................13
7. Deputy R.C. Duhamel of St. Saviour:..................................................14
8. Deputy G.P. Southern of St. Helier:....................................................14
9. Connétable J.M. Refault of St. Peter:...................................................15
10. Deputy J.A. Martin of St. Helier:....................................................15
11. Deputy I.J. Gorst of St. Clement:....................................................17
12. Deputy M.R. Higgins of St. Helier:..................................................17
13. Senator T.A. Le Sueur:..............................................................18
14. Deputy D.J.A. Wimberley of St. Mary : ..............................................18
15. Deputy R.G. Le Hérissier:...........................................................19

2. Public Holidays and Bank Holidays: designation of 19th October (P.33/2011)........21

2.1 Deputy G.P. Southern :..................................................................22

1. Senator J.L. Perchard:..................................................................23
2. Deputy T.M.Pitman:...................................................................23
3. The Connétable of St. Ouen:............................................................25
4. Deputy G.P. Southern :..................................................................25

3. Draft Amendment (No. 15) of the Standing Orders of the States of Jersey (P.35/2011) ...........................................................................................26

3.1 Connétable J. Gallichan of St. Mary (Chairman, Privileges and Procedures Committee): .........................................................................................27

1. The Deputy of St. Mary:................................................................28
2. Deputy F.J. Hill of St. Martin : ..........................................................29
3. Deputy T.M.Pitman:...................................................................29

4. The Connétable of St. Mary:............................................................29

3.3 The Connétable of St. Mary:............................................................30

4. Public elections: voting on Sunday 16th October 2011 (P.40/2011) ....................31

4.1 Deputy T.M. Pitman:...................................................................31

1. Connétable L Norman of St. Clement:..................................................32
2. The Connétable of St. Ouen:............................................................33
3. Deputy M. Tadier :......................................................................33
4. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire: ...............................................................35

5. The Deputy of St. Mary:................................................................35
6. The Connétable of St. Mary:............................................................36
7. Deputy J.A. Martin:....................................................................36
8. Deputy T.M.Pitman:...................................................................37

5. Public Review of the role of the Crown Officers ("Carswell Review"): in Committee' debate (R.28/2011).......................................................................39

5.1 Senator T.A. Le Sueur (The Chief Minister):...........................................39

1. The Connétable of St. Mary:............................................................40
2. Senator T.J. Le Main: ..................................................................40
3. Deputy M. Tadier :......................................................................41
4. Deputy P.J. Rondel of St. John : ........................................................41
5. The Connétable of St. Ouen:............................................................42
6. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire: ...............................................................42

LUNCHEON ADJOURNMENT PROPOSED..................................................43

LUNCHEON ADJOURNMENT................................................................43

7. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:............................................................43
8. Deputy M. Tadier :......................................................................45
9. Deputy C.H. Egré of St. Peter:..........................................................46
10. Senator T.A. Le Sueur:............................................................47
11. Connétable P.F.M. Hanning of St. Saviour:..........................................47
12. Senator S.C. Ferguson:..............................................................48
13. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire:............................................................48
14. The Connétable of St. Mary : ........................................................50
15. The Connétable of St. Brelade:......................................................51
16. Senator P.F. Routier:................................................................52
17. Mr. T.J. Le Cocq Q.C., H.M. Attorney General:.....................................52
18. Deputy J.B. Fox of St. Helier : .......................................................53
19. Senator S.C. Ferguson:..............................................................53
20. Deputy J.M. Maçon of St. Saviour : ..................................................54
21. Deputy J.G. Reed of St. Ouen : ......................................................55
22. Deputy S.Power:....................................................................55
23. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:........................................................56
24. Deputy S. Pitman of St. Helier : ......................................................57
25. The Deputy of St. Martin : ...........................................................57
26. Senator B.I. Le Marquand:..........................................................59
27. Deputy J.A.N. Le Fondré of St. Lawrence:..........................................61
28. Deputy T.M.Pitman:................................................................63
29. Senator J.L. Perchard: ...............................................................65
30. Connétable D.W. Mezbourian of St. Lawrence:......................................66
31. The Connétable of St. Mary : ........................................................68
32. Senator T.A. Le Sueur:..............................................................68
33. Deputy A.K.F. Green of St. Helier : ..................................................68
34. Deputy M.R.Higgins:...............................................................69
35. Connétable S.A. Yates of St. Martin:................................................69
36. Deputy R.G. Le Hérissier:...........................................................69
37. Deputy R.C. Duhamel:..............................................................70
38. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire:............................................................71
39. Deputy M. Tadier :...................................................................73
40. The Connétable of St. Saviour:......................................................76

41. Deputy T.M.Pitman:................................................................76
42. The Deputy of St. Mary:.............................................................77
43. Deputy S.Pitman:...................................................................77
44. The Connétable of St. Mary : ........................................................78

ARRANGEMENT OF PUBLIC BUSINESS FOR FUTURE MEETINGS ....................78

6. The Connétable of St. Mary (Chairman, Privileges and Procedures Committee):.......78

1. Senator P.F. Routier: ...................................................................78
2. Senator A.J.H. Maclean:................................................................79
3. Senator A. Breckon: ....................................................................79
4. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire: ...............................................................79
5. The Deputy of St. Peter : ................................................................79
6. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire: ...............................................................79
7. Senator J.L. Perchard:..................................................................80
8. Senator A. Breckon: ....................................................................80
9. The Deputy of St. John:................................................................80

ADJOURNMENT................................................................................81

[09:30]

The Roll was called and the Vice Dean led the Assembly in Prayer. PUBLIC BUSINESS – resumption

Deputy A.E. Jeune of St. Brelade :

Excuse me, Sir, if I may can I give notice that I will be missing in the early part of this afternoon to attend a funeral.

The Deputy Bailiff :

First of all I give notice to Members that the Bailiff has received from Senator Shenton notice of his resignation as President of the Chairmen's Committee. I understand you do not wish to make a statement, Senator?

Senator B.E. Shenton:

No, I will circulate to Members a copy of my resignation letter later this morning. The Deputy Bailiff :

It will be necessary for the next agenda to contain arrangements for the election of a new president for that committee.  [Interruption] Very well, we now continue the debate on Deputy Le Hérissier's proposition as amended and it is open to Members to speak. Deputy Power.

1. Salaries over £100,000: notification to States Assembly (P.30/2011) - as amended

1.1 Deputy S. Power of St. Brelade :

I want to pull together different tentacles of this debate because Deputy Le Hérissier has focused on a specific issue and that is the salaries of public servants earning in excess of £100,000 a year. The actual substance of this report and proposition has ramifications across this Assembly and, indeed, all the different responsibilities that different States Members have. I would like to touch on a few of those, if I may. All Members of this Assembly are collectively responsible for the approval of the annual budget. The Minister for Treasury and Resources has specific responsibility for delivery of the budget but we have responsibility for passing that budget and while some of us dissent from it and some of us dissent from specific aspects of it, we are responsible for a budget in excess of £650 million a year and rising. A great deal of that budget is in the salaries and wages of the 6,900 souls that employ for and on behalf of the public purse. When you look at the figure in isolation and you look at the salary portion of it, it is quite an astounding figure for a population of 100,000 people. So I wanted to start this by saying that we are responsible for the disbursement of those funds and, indeed, if one wanted to be quite pedantic about it every day that we are an elected Member each one of us is responsible for £33,000 of that money, every day of every year. The next thing I would like to say is that the report and proposition itself on the salaries is symptomatic of a much larger problem. But before I deal with that I want to bring Members back to what Deputy Jeune put down as a written question and the reply on question 18 yesterday. Again, I will refer to the back page of question 18, a page number is not on it but right down at the bottom it has a list of non-States of Jersey staff, these are agency staff paid by the Health and Social Services Department, and it refers specifically to a 9-month contract, a 6-month contract and an 11-month contract. I think part of the problem we seem to be dealing with is that when you look at the role of say a commercial manager on £850 a day, or if you annualised that over 9 months it is £230,000; a head of procurement, who is at £1,000 a day, that is a 6-month contract and that annualises at £180,000; and you have an Interim Director of Human Resources at Health and Social Services, £960 a day, and that is an 11-month contract which annualises to £320,000. The point I want to make is that to those voting members of public, those people in middle income Jersey, these salaries are a pipe dream to a lot of people. While many members of the public think that this Assembly is well paid, when they see those figures they probably realise - in keeping it in perspective - that these people are extremely well paid. I want to link that to what I said when I opened my speech by saying that we are responsible in this Assembly for spending large amounts of the public purse. I think that is why there is such a disconnect between the public and this Assembly right now in that we appear to be almost losing control of what I would refer to in some areas as a runaway train. I have heard it said in this Assembly many times that this Assembly tends to follow a lot of the practices in the U.K. What works in the U.K does not necessarily translate and work easily here. Deputy Le Hérissier referenced in his speech the work of Eric Pickles and, indeed, he then referred to the Hutton report and I think Deputy Martin referred to the Localisation Bill and the attempt within local authorities in the U.K. to control the salaries within county councils and local authorities. They are trying to control them and I would say that what has happened in the U.K., there has been a runaway take-off in salaries within the public sector that now, with the benefit of hindsight and with the recession, these local authorities cannot afford. I would suggest that the problem here in Jersey, not only is Deputy Le Hérissier correct to focus on these salaries that people are aghast at but I would suggest that Jersey's problem is multi-faceted, and I would make the following suggestions as to the overall problem in conjunction with what Deputy Le Hérissier's report and proposition says, amended. That is, there is a view out there, and I came across it in the Population Office as I am sure Deputy Green is now, there is a view out there that there is expertise in the Island that sometimes cannot be attracted into the public service in Jersey. I think that is wrong. I think that in this Island today, whether you are Jersey-born, whether you are an immigrant or you have come into work, is awash with highly qualified people, experts - just to name a few - in running  businesses, experts  in small businesses, experts  in accountancy, experts in law and we see, time after time in the local media, local companies getting international awards for their expertise. So we have this pool of expertise on the Island and the next thing is to translate, how do you get that expertise out of the private sector, take a drop in salary and come into the public sector? That may solve part of the problem that we have got in terms of these salaries of over £100,000 a year going out of control. I would suggest that the psyche in the public service .. Sir, I am struggling to carry on here because there is an awful lot of

noise coming from my left. The Deputy Bailiff :

It is most unlikely, Deputy . Deputy S. Power:

It is not this left, it is over there somewhere. I do not mean left, left, I mean left of my left ear. There is psyche in the public service that discourages recruitment from the private sector into the public service and I do not know why that psyche exists but it does exist and I did come across it. I know the Constable of St. John and I had a number of battles last year with regard to recommendations that were not happy with that encapsulated that problem. The other problem that is occurring out there and why I think we have got this runaway train, is the States itself.

[9:45]

This Assembly can be incredibly destructive in the way we approach appointments, the way we approach competent authorities that we hire and at times there is gross political interference in the way we set up competent authorities to hire these people that we know we need. I would say that this Assembly must take some responsibility for some of the problems that we have out there at the moment. The next problem that I have identified is that within the public service, when you get into the salaries of £100,000 plus, there is a phenomenon called empire building and this empire building is simply manifested  like this. You may have a very competent person in a States department .. I will take out the word "very". I will say that there is a competent person in a States department, who he or she feels that they are under pressure and they then suggest that in order for them to progress their career, in order for them to be promoted within the public sector, they then recommend the recruitment of somebody else to come in under them. So therefore the pyramid increases exponentially and the States then, through its Ministers, hire people to increase the pyramid and that is itself a problem. That comes back to what somebody else said yesterday, that responsibility must reflect performance-related competence in the public sector and I agree 100 per cent with what Deputy Gorst said yesterday, I think the Hay evaluation and the Hay way of assessing public servants  [Approbation] is completely out of date. Deputy Gorst gave one example of the Chief Officer of the Social Security Department who disperses a huge cash budget every year and I will give a second one, and that is the Chief Officer of the Housing Department who does not have as big a cash budget as the Social Security Chief Officer but he has a responsibility for running an annual turnover of £35 million, but not only that he has the responsibility for an asset base of something approaching £1 billion. He is one of the lowest paid chief officers in the public service, and I would say this Island gets extremely good value for money from chief officers like that. So there is something inherently wrong with the way we do business within the public service. This Assembly has got to take responsibility for it and has got

to act. I have said this before, and I am going to say it again, when we deal with the salaries of senior  public officials - senior  civil  servants - it  seems to  me that at times,  in certain States departments the tail is wagging the dog. In other words, that we are being dictated what to do by those that we employ. I do not know quite how we deal with that, except that Ministers and the Council of Ministers are going to have to deal with that. It seems to me that we are awash in reports and Regulations and Orders and reports and propositions and we do not necessarily drive them but we do have to process them. I sometimes wonder at some of the stuff that comes through this Assembly, who is producing all this paper work and is it really necessary. So, I speak this morning with a degree of frustration because I think Deputy Le Hérissier's report and proposition is symptomatic of a much larger problem within the public service. There are very good departments but there are other departments where the control and the performance is like a full moon in a fog, we are not quite sure what we are looking at. I learnt in my time as an Assistant Minister, from Senator Le Main, how difficult it can be sometimes to refuse to make decisions which would make the Minister or the Senator unpopular, but to give Senator Le Main his due, he did make those decisions and he did get a berating from certain other States departments. Going back to my opening remarks, this Assembly has got to be acutely conscious of how we spend money. One of the biggest ways we spend money is on salaries within this Island. Deputy Le Hérissier's report and proposition is necessary, it is symptomatic of a much larger problem. I would like to see the whole recruitment process within the States of Jersey looking towards the high calibre management that are already in the Island, in the public sector, in legal, accounting, finance and looking to recruit those people. Sometimes working in the public service is not just about salary. Sometimes working in the public service is about prestige, it is about status and it is about public service. For the number of times that this Assembly is criticised we must .. I am reminded of the fact that we are in here and we are public servants. We are here because we do want to serve. There are private individuals out there who would be attracted into the public service but, for whatever reason, this Assembly and the way that we carry out our business does not allow that to happen. I hope when we come to the end of this debate that most Members will support this proposition. I find it a frustrating experience to go through again but I think it is necessary and I hope Members will

support the report and proposition. Thank you.

1. Deputy P.V.F. Le Claire of St. Helier :

Yesterday I spoke about the 33rd report on senior salaries that I discovered from the U.K. (United Kingdom) Parliament website, which was presented in March of this year and I have spoken through the debate in relation to each of the amendments as to how I thought it was linked and why I thought it was necessary for us to support all of the amendments. I think the amendments have made the process much stronger and especially the late approval yesterday of Deputy Vallois'. I would like to put across - and the Chief Minister is possibly listening in the ante-Chamber, he is not in the Chamber at the moment - a view that hopefully that the Minister for Social Security can take to him, on the back of Deputy Power's speech, we set up a States Members' remuneration body to take these issues away from this Assembly so that we would not be forever in here debating our pay. More importantly, I do not think we should be in here forever debating other people's pay either. I would just like to touch upon this review because I think what it is doing and what is achieving is something I think we need to consider implementing ourselves. I think it would be wise for us to consider having a similar review body standing in place, working with the Comptroller and Auditor General on a regular basis. Now, it may be something that the States Members Remuneration Review Board could tack on or it may be something that requires greater expertise, possibly, or greater funding or greater resources, I am not certain, but I am certain that what they are doing in the United Kingdom seems to be a positive way forward. The first thing is that the review body would .. I just put this into context, in supporting this proposition I think that we have taken a step in the right direction but I would hope that the outcome of this debate would be that the Ministers, in bringing back their solutions, would consider this as a possible solution; whether or not we would like to extend in the future or in the near future an invitation to the States Remuneration Review Body to incorporate these other sectors. This independent review body, which is a standing body, as I mentioned yesterday, has far-reaching abilities, it provides independent advice to the Prime Minister, the Lord Chancellor, the Secretary of State for Defence and the Secretary of State for Health on the remuneration of holders of judicial office, senior civil servants, senior officers of the armed forces, very senior managers in the N.H.S. (National Health Service) and other such public appointments as may from time to time be specified. They take into account in their terms of reference a number of matters, I will not go through them, but they do include such issues as the recruitment, retention, motivation and suitable availability of people, the regional local variations, government policies, funds available, the Government's inflation targets, the differences in employment conditions, the rights and access to relative job security and they weight them on different criteria. What is important is that they do this all of the time and they go and seek evidence all of the time on these issues. At the same time they take on board the other reviews that are ongoing within the United Kingdom, such as the Hutton report and the Cunningham I think it was. They take on board the other bodies of work that are going on and they incorporate those into their review and recommendations. When they come back with their review, they do not just talk about what they think they should be awarding as a percentage, they break it down comprehensively and talk about the salaries and whether or not those salaries are appropriate for the positions and the level of operation of those positions as we got forward. They call for evidence, they take into account the economic climate and the government policies and, most importantly, they are funded by the manpower and economics arm of the Government so it is possibly something that would be available to take on board from economics. I think unless we are going to forever come back .. I would like to commend Deputy Le Hérissier in doing this because it is a good step in the right direction. In fact it is a massive step in the right direction. But unless we are going to be brought back here again and again and again on these issues - and I certainly would not like to be - I think we have got to do something like this. I would really like to ask the Minister for .. I know he is busy looking at the Island Plan but I would really like the Minister for Social Security, whose attention I am trying to seek, to take on board my speech today. I think that we do need to look at implementing a standalone separate review body that can call for evidence, and in all areas, not just the £100,000 band but also in senior salaries from £50,000 upwards, including the Judiciary, because they do. If we are going to focus our attention from time to time on runaway trains and huge matters of importance .. I will give one example as I finish, we have just allocated a shadow board to Harbours and Airports because we recognise the huge body of work and the important work that they have got to do. But I would put it as much as that remit is important, the portfolio of property in the long term does not equate to anything like the payroll costs of this Island long term. It is the payroll costs that need to be looked at. Finally, those also include the benefits as highlighted by Deputy Power and in this report, which I am hoping the

Minister will have a read of, they make a judgment about pensions and they give a clear steer as to where they are being steered on the pension issue. It is not just the salary that is attractive to people that want to work within the States of Jersey, the States of Jersey is, in the main, in my view, although there are in any big organisation some downsides, I think overall the States of Jersey as a place to work is a good place to work, it is a place where a lot of people want to work and like working and I think it is something we can be proud of. But I also think that we need to bear in mind and need to recognise it is also a pretty safe environment. They do not have targets to meet like in the corporate world .. they have targets but they do not have bonuses to achieve like in the corporate world. In the corporate world they have to run their organisation and they have to make a hefty profit.

2. Deputy A.E. Jeune :

The reasons for this proposition are clear to us all and have been explained by Deputy Le Hérissier and endorsed by others. I really do not know that it is our role to be controlling senior pay. We have Hay evaluation which appears to work in a number of other places. So I do not know why it does not work for the States. Or maybe I do. We employ H.R. (Human Resources) people and pay them well in my opinion, but at this time I feel we have no alternative but to rein-in something that has clearly gone well outside of what might be called normal acceptable boundaries and away from policies that have been set in the past.

[10:00]

This is endorsed by the Comptroller and Auditor General's report we received this week, for which I believe we should thank him for producing in such a timely manner. This report states that policy has not been adhered to. Policy is our role but given that we now have a vacant position at the helm of H.R. we must be seen by those who we represent to be taking control. We in this Assembly are supposed to be working towards reducing our spending. Yet it would appear that we have - and I will say it the same as Deputy Power said - a runaway train. Maybe it is because we live close the Railway Walk that we use that expression. But this is a runaway train certainly in one area of the States and at a time when other jurisdictions are finding it necessary to dispense with a number of persons with such management expertise. We appear to continue to empire-build in some areas. What part of savings do we not understand? It really is not rocket science. I should very much like to know how the Minister for Treasury and Resources justifies some of the goings on right now. Was he and the Treasurer of the States aware of the amount of money being spent? As the Minister for Social Security said yesterday, the Chief Officer of Social Security, when it comes to the points scoring fee remuneration, because he and his staff work so efficiently and effectively they do not come so high in the pecking order as those who just spend, spend, spend. We have been paying high salaries in some areas for years and all we seem to have achieved is a mess. Yesterday this  Assembly  agreed to  exclude all clinical  locum appointments  from this proposition and on my way home I heard on the radio that this was interpreted as locum doctors. I would like to remind Members that clinicians are not just doctors. I would also say to Members that I believe if we looked at other hospitals we would most likely find that there are agreed pay bands that determine how much can be paid to locum doctors. At this point I must say I do believe we are very fortunate to have the medical and surgical staff we do. Certainly the one I am aware of, whose professionalism and dedication I acknowledge and I hasten to add I have not been the patient and I wish to keep it that way. But again, what I saw certainly ticked all the right boxes for me. But I want to ensure that we keep people of such calibre and I can think that we make our environment a place where they want to live and work, that they know we value them. How could we expect them to stay and work  for us if they felt we gave preference to excessively paid managers or locum doctors who they believe can name their price? While I am talking about managers, have we seen any reduction of such in the Health Department? I seem to recall we saw some reduction of nursing staff though. How sustainable will our health service be if we keep haemorrhaging money in the manner that we currently are? While it is noted that the Comptroller and Auditor General in his report has shown openness, which included his own remuneration, I believe we do not have openness everywhere and this can be seen the answers that officers are providing their Minister with, for example, question 18 of the written questions this week. The reply decides to exclude clinical staff, why? We were not given an explanation. Members will be aware that when I asked the Chief Minister yesterday whether there was any policy that excluded information relating to clinical staff being provided, he was not aware of any such policy; although I appreciate he said he would check. But as the chair of the States Employment Board I would expect if there was a clear policy for this he would be aware. We must also accept that when we are looking for senior posts at the centre we are highly unlikely to find someone who has expertise in every area that the States covers unless we look at a similar jurisdiction, for example, Guernsey, the Isle of Man and other small Island environments which is why we must also look to sharing posts with our sister Island, something we seem to do a lot of talking about - does that sound familiar - but we do not seem to demonstrate any action about. We are also doing a very poor job on succession planning. Deputy Vallois' amendment ensures that the Minister will be held to account for decisions made to highly paid posts and that is fair enough. What we still do not appear to have is a process which ensures that those in highly paid posts are held to account. We have seen this time and time again over the years. As I said at the beginning, I do not know that it is our role to be in the nitty-gritty of deciding on pay scales but it is our role to set the policy and Deputy Gorst 's amendment should hopefully bring forward a mechanism to ensure that any procedure this Assembly has set within its policy is adhered to and those who administer it are held to account. Let us not forget that this is taxpayer's money that we are charged to manage, that we are charged to ensure that Islanders get value for money, that services they need are provided in the most appropriate way. This is about them, not us, and I certainly hope we will all support this proposition.

3. Deputy M. Tadier of St. Brelade :

Before I start the main thrust of my speech I want to qualify what I am about to say by saying that of course I completely endorse this proposition, even as it is amended and it is absolutely good for transparency as a government that we are accountable to the public, especially when there is a great perception that there are very high salaries - perhaps too high - that are being paid in certain sectors of the public service. I also want to say that of course I agree that there can always be efficiencies and we should always challenge the way we do things as a business to make sure that we are getting value for money for the taxpayer. But I do think it is also necessary in a debate like this to bring perspective on to the nature of the public sector and the staff, wherever they are in our organisation, because I think it has to be reiterated that the majority, the vast majority of staff, in the public sector do an amazing job and often it is not recognised. [Approbation] That is a good thing in one sense because a good system you do not necessarily want to see what is going on in the background, the machine keeps on working. We had a good meeting yesterday with the new Police Chief and he said similar words, that you do not want to notice the police, if policing is being done well you do not notice them and I think the same applies, to a certain extent, to the public sector. Clearly there are high profile cases which do get flagged-up for media attention in particular, especially when very high salaries or very high fees are being paid to staff and we have seen some very high profile cases. I think it is necessary to put that into perspective because out of all the staff who are being paid more than £100,000, I am sure that the vast majority do provide value for money. That is something that we need to continue to monitor. We also need to .. I am very concerned of the line the media take and the line that we sometimes take as politicians leads to a system which breeds cynicism of the public sector and also in a similar way to sometimes the media breeds cynicism of politicians. We are all workers, we are all doing our jobs and clearly we are never going to keep everybody happy. I am concerned about the consequences that has to our organisation, which, at the end of the day, is here to serve the public. It is seems to me sometimes that we want, or the public want, or there is an argument that we want socialism in the public sector so we want everybody getting paid the same. We do not want people getting high wages; we want everyone getting roughly the same wages. But in the private sector if we even suggested we would be called communists, and say: "No, keep your noses out of what is going on in the private sector." It is important, I think, to remind us, if we look at the ratios which are being paid between the

lowest paid in the States and the highest paid, you are looking at roughly a ratio of 1:10 so somebody at the bottom who is maybe getting, let us say, £20,000 a year, somebody at the very top end is getting £200,000, maybe £250,000 a year, but that is completely at odds with what happens in the private sector where people are working for the minimum wage and people are getting very high wages in certain industries, not to mention the benefits in kind, the bonuses. I think it is important that the public in particular remember this. Of course they should be asking, and we should be asking, for value for money in the public sector but it is also incumbent, I think, for members of the public or ourselves to ask why is it that things are so expensive out there. The other point is that I think it has been raised already, the public sector does not work for profit. There might be some areas which are cross-subsidised but ultimately the States of Jersey, and any government, should not be a profit-making organisation. It should aim to fund the social need and roughly come out with balanced books. So I think these are necessary statements to make. Of course that does not mean that the system is perfect. We have heard - and I have certainly seen - anecdotal evidence in some departments of empire building, of perhaps cronyism. I am not saying that is widespread by any means but there is an element of that, there is a perception certainly on the surface of things that some people get their friends in, they have been in positions for 20, 25 years and of course they are perhaps slightly too cosy, more so than one would want. But that raises the question, where is the responsibility, where does the responsibility lie? Clearly there has to be political responsibility. This is not something which is unique to Jersey of course because we know that civil servants are there pretty much .. not for life but they are there for a long period of time and they are, in reality, the ones who set policy direction and get things moving. That should not be the case and it is very important I think over the next few years we have politicians who, for all of our differences, need to make sure that we provide political leadership and we have clear policy direction. Perhaps that is difficulty in our system because we do not stand for election on political directives, so to speak. It is pretty much luck of the draw what you get and then civil servants can carry on running the show. So we should not necessarily be surprised that we are in this situation. I would just emphasis that it is .. I do not think that the public necessarily worry

about high wages per se, it is value for money. [10:15]

That is certainly something I want to know that I am getting and it is not always the case in certain instances. I think that is all I really need to say but I think we need to put this in perspective, we need to remember that the people who are the public service are doing exactly what it says on the tin, that they are serving and they are serving the public. Many of these people, even though it may sound strange for me to say, even if they are earning £150,000, £200,000 a year, where else could they be working? They could be in industries where they could be getting £500,000, £1 million plus bonuses plus company car, which they do not get in the public sector. Of course there is job security, of course we hope that the States of Jersey is and will continue to be a nice work environment in which to work. However there are trade-offs and I think that it is very important that during these debates we remember that because we can have unintended - or perhaps intended - consequences which can breed false cynicism in what is, at the end of the day, a very good public sector with very good workers. But if there are problems, let us show the leadership and let us make sure we get our house in order.

4. Senator S.C. Ferguson:

I can assure Members that I may sound as if I am dying but I have not gone yet. Deputy Power annualised the figures for agency staff in question 18 of the written questions yesterday. I would remind Members that those figures include agency fees plus transport and accommodation. I was recently told with some indignation of a short term post which was being paid at the equivalent of £228,000 a year. However, I looked into it and once we had dissected the figures the actual underlying salary was on an annual basis, £125,000 for a high level, short-term contract. We must look at the underlying numbers before we pontificate. Not that I am accusing Deputy Power of

pontificating. Basically I am all in favour of transparency. We are now all aware of the salaries and pension funds, of our senior civil servants. We are also told in the Comptroller and Auditor General's report that such information will be published in the annual accounts of the States as a matter of course and in the interests of transparency. Deputy Le Hérissier has apparently brought this proposition because of the perception that the States have lost control of the salaries of senior civil servants. But according to the Comptroller and Auditor General this is not the case as he states quite unequivocally on page 8 of his report: "Those instances, almost all, relate to a single appointment, the lack of control relates to a single appointment." I am really rather concerned about the insistence that salaries for new appointments over £100,000 will be notified to the States possibly in a format similar to the 168 declarations for property. This seems to me to be taking micromanagement to the extreme. I share the concerns of Members over the lack of adherence to States policies of the single appointment which has been highlighted recently. However, I cannot see any logic for the States to demand that they should be advised of the salaries of every new employee over £100,000. I agree that the policies should be reviewed to ensure that there is consistency and compliance with overall policies but other than that, the publication of details in the annual accounts should suffice. We have to balance a right to privacy with value for money for taxpayers. My feeling is that this is an intrusion too far. The problem with a witch hunt such as this is that it starts to look as if we begrudge paying this money. In fact it might even look as if we were indulging in a slight touch of the green eye. Whatever you think about senior civil servants, they have had considerable training, in fact more training than perhaps the average politician. I accept that some of the Members have had more years of training or study than others but that does not necessarily count for anything at the ballot box. On the other hand, if you are working within an organisation such as the States then the years of training and working do count. My feeling is that the solution is not to try and impose salary control; and make no mistake, this is salary control.

It is surely .. it is pretty well Animal Farm type politics. It is surely better to have fewer well paid people who are fully utilising their talents. Our main concern is that there should be an efficient organisation. It should not be to nit-pick and pontificate. While I am on my feet, perhaps a few words regarding Hay would not come amiss. I, like Deputy Gorst , wondered about the Hay system so I googled it. It seems to me, looking at the evidence, that this is the only widely used system available to make comparisons for non-comparable jobs. It is widely used throughout the world and no one has managed to come up with a better system. However, it does seem that it is possible to update and calibrate use of the system, usually by calling in the Hay Company to evaluate current usage. It seems to me [Interruption]. Sorry, Sir, yes I hold up my hand.

The Deputy Bailiff :

Are you talking to yourself again, Senator?

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Absolutely, it is the only sensible conversation I get, Sir.

The Deputy Bailiff :

No doubt, but £10 will be duly credited to the fund in due course. Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Yes, Sir. Returning to the Hay system, it does seem that it is possible to update and calibrate use of the system, usually by calling in the Hay Company to evaluate current usage. It would seem to me that before we throw out the baby with the bath water we should perhaps consider whether the system needs recalibration. To return to the proposition, while we are somewhat of a cross between a local authority and the central government, we in this Assembly are legislators. We consider policy and it is up to the civil servants to deliver on that policy. Ministers devise policy which is then brought to this Assembly. Ministers should not get involved with the minutiae of delivery of a policy, they should only give political guidance to their chief officers on aspects of the policy proposed. We should be approving a policy for pay within the Civil Service. If a proposed salary looks excessive then the Minister should give political guidance to the chief officer. We should not, in this Assembly, expect to pronounce on the salary level for a particular job. How will we assess it? On what basis? How many people in this Assembly have the knowledge or experience to do this? I am particularly concerned that we are starting to micromanage the States, and I am also concerned that we may have started to erode Article 8 of the Human Rights Law, the right to privacy. Yes, we must have transparency, we must be seen to be getting the best value for money for taxpayers but do we really need to have a star Chamber for every position earning more than £100,000 a year? I think not. I shall not be supporting this proposition.

5. Deputy T.M. Pitman of St. Helier :

That was a good cue because I am the star of the Chamber after all. Only joking. I know the Senator did not mean it that way. I am shocked. It is really good what Deputy Power would probably call one of my fellow colleagues of the far left just spoke recently because we did indeed meet the Police Chief yesterday and he was really refreshing, a really positive gentleman and it was really refreshing to hear him say how he absolutely welcomed political scrutiny because some of the nonsense we have heard put out from certain Members over these last months really give a false picture of about how people need to be held to account. I think that is the bit we are missing in some of the speeches today. I am obviously going to support my colleague, Deputy Le Hérissier, in this but I do want to speak briefly on a small number of points. The first is that while this is certainly warranted it is possibly not the best way to achieve the intent, because I see it as just one part of a problem. One part of a problem that certainly will not be eradicated just by supporting it. To this degree, I believe that we really do need some of the more vociferous Members of what some of us would call the far right, certainly the free market capitalists, to try and develop at least a basic understanding of global economics because it does inform all of this. A good illustration of this, and it is very, very relevant, is that those interviewers need to recognise that the recent and indeed current global economic meltdown was caused by colossal stupidity, greed and incompetence of elements within the global finance industry. Not only do they need to accept that but they need to stop trying to transfer the blame for this on to hardworking, generally low level public sector workers, because this is being spun the world over and it is disingenuous to say the least. It is, I think, totally immoral and it is funny how the capitalists get all very quiet on this issue when they cannot face up to the flaws in their own system. I am not anti-capitalism but as many economic commentators will say, the way it is being worked in the world at the moment is not the best way to do so. I will go back to my favourite economist of the moment, Ha-Joon Chang's - who I seem to be completely enamoured with - assessment of the world. I am pleased that some Members have touched on Hay because it does need to be commented on and as someone who has worked within, and indeed been actively involved in this process as a staff representative, I do think that I am well placed to comment on some of the problems. The first is probably to simply observe that while I understand why my colleague plumbed for this magical £100,000 threshold, Mr. Pickles' figure - it is a very emotive figure, is it not - I would have preferred it probably if he had targeted this with closer analysis of particular grades involved. Because one of the real problems in Hay is when you get to those gradees who get themselves into a position where they can subsequently grow their own empires, that is where the problems with Hay really lie. As a consequence, much to our surprise, before long they can see justification for their grade rising because they have become ever so more important, with ever more staff under them, with lovely titles often. This does have much more relevance to this than this £100,000 figure. The sad fact about Hay is that it serves a lot of lower grades well, but worse it fails many on lower grades because it does not do them justice. When I hear the Hay system just dismissed out of hand it does make me a little angry because that is quite wrong and it shows a lack of understanding of the

situation. [10:30]

It leads to some of those people who are on very low grades yet do very good work being made scapegoats for, as I say, the free marketeers who are happy to pay some people at the very top astronomical salaries, far beyond their merit, far beyond what they deliver, yet when we talk about great saving drives and we end up sacking a couple of road sweepers or manual workers or frontline staff and a pen-pusher who does not do a great deal of work but gets some of his subordinates to do that work, is happily left in place to grow and grow their little empire. That is the real problem with Hay and it is something that needs to be recognised. Senator Ferguson talked about bringing in the Hay company to evaluate this when problems happen and I have experienced that, people coming in. What it unfortunately resulted in is newly created managers who have very strangely come out  exactly the same grade and score that the people they were going to  be managing, or the people below them were manipulated down 1.5 points as I recall. That is the way it works, it cannot be relied on. That is the other flaw. We have to remember, as Deputy Tadier rightly said, the average public sector worker does an absolutely brilliant job and we are really being unfair to them when we are setting up the situation, and we hear it in this House time and time again from the right, these people are being made the scapegoat for all the ills of the world at the moment. It is bad for their morale and it is has to be bad for the community, especially one as small as ours. These are Jersey people, or our people, the Island's people, they all contribute to the Island's economy and I think it is about time some in this House started respecting them a little more. I supported the amendment yesterday because I really was convinced about the problems that we had to make sure did not emerge in Health. I would hope that that can be kept in check by the Ministers involved. We often argue that we spend too much time in this Assembly discussing ourselves or  irrelevancies and we certainly do not  want to  be discussing 300 or  400 alleged contentious pay awards. I think this can work but I suppose the proof will be in the pudding. I do think that the Deputy deserves support. I do not think it is the perfect answer. It certainly will not work without the other issues being tackled that I have highlighted and I applaud him for bringing

it. I would urge all Members to support him. Deputy R.G. Le Hérissier of St. Saviour :

Could I make a point of clarification - and I thank Deputy Pitman for those words - to Senator Ferguson. The notion of the automatic referral of every position earning £100,000 to the Assembly has, of course, been put at rest by Deputy Gorst 's amendment. My proposal is now a consideration which the States Employment Board will take on board when they are looking at this issue and report back to us in an interim way in 2 weeks' time. We are not discussing, in the pure sense, what I originally put forward. We are discussing it as very substantially amended.

6. Connétable M.K. Jackson of St. Brelade :

As a member of S.E.B. (States Employment Board) I feel I must comment on the Hay evaluation process and comments made by Deputy Power earlier. One of the key indicators in the Hay system is, of course, manpower and as a consequence chief officers of departments employing higher numbers will have a higher points score. It is easy to criticise this system but in the absence of a better alternative it is at least best to have a system that is proven. That is not to say that it should not be reviewed and I think this is the case. Given that the proposition has been prompted by a contract appointment at the hospital and the Comptroller and Auditor General in his report has remarked upon the disconnect between central H.R. and the hospital, and notwithstanding the S.E.B. amendment, I think it is necessary for the S.E.B. to work with Health and the Social Services Department to formulate a controlled structure to enable short term necessary appointments to be made but in a structure dictated by the S.E.B. I do not think the S.E.B. have enough knowledge of senior management appointments and arrangements with agencies and suggest that the Deputy 's proposition, and the Comptroller and Auditor General's report will stimulate a clarity in this situation which is long overdue. As a member of the board I need the knowledge, we need the knowledge, all Members need the knowledge if they are to be accountable to the States and I thank the Deputy Le Hérissier for his proposition, I think it will advance progress.

7. Deputy R.C. Duhamel of St. Saviour :

I am reminded in this debate by words that were written by an eminent mathematician, Augustus de Morgan, a number of years ago which do have some relevance to the subject that is under discussion. Perhaps I could read them. It is very short. He said in answering a poem that was written by Jonathan Swift about systems that had the tendency to grow in an unbounded fashion the following: "Great fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite them and little fleas have lesser fleas and so ad infinitum. The great fleas themselves in turn have greater fleas to go on, while these again have greater still and greater still and so on." It strikes me that the comments from the Constable of St. Brelade about the Hay evaluation being based on manpower and the comments that are being expressed by some Members at the ability of the system to grow in an unbounded fashion perhaps demand further discussion. I think a number of Members have also begun to touch on the wider debate which really should, and I hope does, come about as a result of an acceptance of the proposition by Deputy Le Hérissier and that is the fairness of paid differentials in any particular society. We heard from Deputy Tadier that at the moment, in his estimation, the people at the bottom to the people at the top are roughly separated by a difference of 10 times of the salary of the lowest, but that begs the issue as to whether or not in today's society this is fair. If we pick up what happens in other countries, certainly if we take the American dream for a capitalist society, we do have a tendency for an acceptance of the norm to agree to pay people whatever they can receive. Certainly that system has crossed the Atlantic in the last few years, I feel, with the difficulties that have exhibited themselves within the banking system. Is it right, and I am not suggesting at any point at the moment that our top paid officials are paid in equivalent terms to famous footballers or indeed banking members to the levels that have been expressed in the newspapers where some people are earning salaries of tens of millions of pounds for doing jobs that are really questionable in terms of their importance compared to the people lower down the food chain. This really is the nub of the problem. If in endorsing a pay system which is based on differentials between the top and the bottom and it does exhibit some tendency to follow the hierarchal nature of control systems that we have, then inevitability there is going to be a bit of a problem. But that problem really has to be addressed by the wider community through the States, through the Government to determine what type of society, as I said earlier, is fair and should be supported. That is probably enough on that issue. As I said, just to recap, I do support Deputy Le Hérissier in bringing this forward. It at least opens the issue perhaps to the consideration of the wider problem and I am hoping that both Deputy Le Hérissier or indeed others who look at the issue will be encouraged to come forward to bring the wider issue to this House for further debate so that we can all endeavour to set out what is the fairest system for the whole of the Island into the

future.

8. Deputy G.P. Southern of St. Helier :

I am somewhat surprised to be an hour and 10 minutes into the proceedings and still be talking about this proposition because it seemed to me that yesterday we had a lengthy and good presentation by Deputy Le Hérissier of what he proposed and the principles behind it and we had an excellent debate that lasted nearly 2 hours on the amendment which, again, explored all the issues. I did not speak then so I will beg your indulgence to speak now. I would encourage Members to recognise that I think we have done this to death for a while now. I just draw Members' attention to what it is we are proposing. We are proposing to request the board to give consideration to the feasibility of introducing a notification procedure as part of new procedures. "To request the board to give consideration to the feasibility of introducing a notification procedure." Earlier it says: "A new mechanism to control and monitor senior salaries." Can we really control senior salaries? I am always somewhat amused when I hear free marketeers hoist by their own petard. Can we, in Jersey, control senior salaries? Unlikely. Why? Because of the basic law of supply and demand.

Where do we get our senior managers from? By and large we get them from the U.K. What is happening in the U.K.? Senior management salaries are spiralling. They may be able to control senior management salaries, although I doubt it, we certainly cannot. We are at the mercy of market forces, basic supply and demand. So when Deputy Power said: "I feel frustrated." Yes, it is the frustration of Canute, I think, trying to control the tides. It is almost inevitable, supply and demand will out. So let us bear in mind that what we are voting for here, while we would love to be able to control, we are not. Just like with the migration debate that we are going to have in 3 or 4 months' time, it will say it will control but what it means is we will count, we will receive notification: "Oh yes, these people are being paid over £100,000." You cannot get a heart surgeon to come and work for £50,000. That is the reality. Where we might have control, and this is what I fear is while we shall let the top-end continue in its ever rising spiral, because simply, quite simply, we cannot control that. Where will we, therefore, attempt to control? I believe we are going to end up, before the end of this year and very shortly in fact, in debating the next business plan, to start to try and control from the bottom-up. That is where the frustration will come out or we must be seen to do something, we are going to control salaries at the bottom end. Indeed the Tribal report says exactly that. First item on the agenda for discussing terms and conditions for our public sector workers is the possibility of a 2-year pay freeze, which would save us £14 million over the 2 years that we are talking about. What is the target that we are supposed to get from pay and conditions, reductions for public sector? Why? It happens to be £14 million. We can control that and I believe that is where we will end up doing it. That is going to be as much trouble as trying to control the top-end. But let us face reality. We cannot control those top-end salaries, we are monitoring only, we are counting them in and we are counting them out.

9. Connétable J.M. Refault of St. Peter :

I just feel compelled to have a couple of words very quickly, if I may. While supporting the principle of the proposition, I do intend to go with it in the spirit of openness and transparency, I am rather disappointed about some of the comments that some of the Members have made about the general process of H.R. Can I, through you, Sir, direct them to page 8 of the independent review by the Comptroller and Auditor General delivered to us just a few days ago, and if I may just pick out a couple of comments from this report. Under section 20, item 3: "In all other instances, for the appointments covered by my review the States rules and policies were followed in every particular" and the most telling comment is on item 21: "In short I have not found evidence that suggests that the States have lost control of the remuneration offered to senior management." I need to make that point clear that an independent review says: "We have not lost control" and I think Deputy Le Hérissier's proposition helps us to maintain our controls.

[10:45]

10. Deputy J.A. Martin of St. Helier :

It is good to follow the Constable of St. Peter this time because I agree and I think I will probably support this but I do think we have a sledgehammer to crack a nut. It says one appointment and it does happen to be at Health. It started before that, it was within Treasury. Even the C.A.G. (Comptroller and Auditor General) says interim appointments are out of our jurisdiction. I do like when central H.R., everything comes from the centre except when it goes wrong and they have gone heading for the hills and suddenly it is all down to H.S.S.D. (Health and Social Services Department) interim human resources who were employed by the centre. So we can go round and round and round. Yes, obviously there were mistakes made. Are we paying too much? Only time will tell. This person has been set a task to do and it is a very hard task, and I have been in Health since 2001 and nobody there has been able to this task. It is not going to be a task that is going to help everybody and politically as well. I just heard a mumble in the back of my head that we do not need heart surgeons in Jersey. Yes, heart, maybe not because it is so specialist but where do we cut the line, who do we need in Jersey? This, as I say, and I think Deputy Southern also said it, we are controlling .. the price of what you pay is what you get, and I do think .. and I upset Deputy Le

Claire yesterday because I said I could use the internet as well and he took it personally and it was not meant to be personal. But I do think him and Deputy Power are totally naïve to think that there are people working in big accountancy firms, legal firms, who would drop £150,000 to come and work for the States of Jersey. Why are they not clambering up? We have had it through the Law Officers in the last few years and I was on the panel, the Advisory Panel. They were not clambering to come and work for the States. Why? I think we do have a problem. We talk about you cannot touch them if they are at the bottom, you cannot touch them at the top, and I think the frustration of getting anybody to work in the public sector is you are only as good as your weakest link. Some of our weakest links seem to hang around for a very long time. We have just paid millions and millions in V.R. (Voluntary Redundancy). Nobody seems to get the sack and that frustrates me. This is not just here, this is in the U.K. and if anyone things Pickles or this other report is sorting them out, they are already running for the hills, it is not M.P.s (Members of Parliament), it is not covered by M.P.s, M.P.s will not be discussing the secretary like in Yes, Minister. It is Yes, Minister behind the scenes, very, very highly paid, been there for years, have no political alliance, who look after themselves very, very well. So, the Deputy has brought something.. C.A.G., they will not have any problem to come back because on page 37 all the recommendations of the C.A.G. where it was not included will be interims. Will be interims. S.E.B. should know what is going on, central H.R. should know what is going on, and if Health do need, because it is such a specialism .. I have never been happy that Health, and there is probably others, went to the centre because it is such a specialised area. Not in management but in clinicians and obviously maybe sometimes in management because managing consultants and everything else, who have had a good .. they work under their own rules. They have done it in the N.H.S. for years and they are being pulled back and we need to do it here. Have we got the right man for the job? That is probably getting a bit off of the .. but this is what this is all about. It should have come last year, it should have come when the Interim Treasury person .. and I think they were earning more than this. We started something but is it good to pay an interim a bit more on a set contract that they are going to get the job done? If the service and the tick boxes are not there after so many months they are off. You do not pay them any more or you employ someone with full pension rights .. and somehow we have got nothing, and it has to be top to bottom, I cannot defend a low paid worker who does not do their work or a high paid worker. So it is a complete overhaul of this we need. This will not do it. It will take years, it is political, you are asking people to cut the Education budget, put the private school fees up, that obviously come from a chief officer, the Minister never thought of it all himself. Politically, everyone went running for the hills, even all the other Ministers, in the majority. So please do not think that this is going to work. I will support it only for the fact it is a start but it needs a complete overhaul. Performance-related pay is exactly.. if you have not got any performance you get no pay and your job is not there because it is not the cosy club, it should not be the cosy club any more and I am just sorry that we are just focusing on one mistake that was not .. to me it is across the board. It happened at Health, as I say, through central H.R. and I wish S.E.B. good luck in the next 2 weeks but, as I said before, C.A.G. have done their recommendations but it is systemic, it goes a lot, lot deeper and it is, why did we pay millions? I am not saying to take people out of the system. Were all of them needed? If they are not needed and they are not performing, why is there not a performance and they go. I think I have said enough, I will support this grudgingly because I really do not think it will do what the Deputy wants and although he says it does not mean that everything can be discussed, when S.E.B.

bring back their recommendations for amendment, and I already know a Deputy behind me is waiting to see what the recommendations are, we will amend. So then we will have another discussion again. That is the way it goes in the House and good luck to everyone involved, but I really wish this was the answer, but, as I say, it is a much, much more deeply rooted problem.

Deputy A.T. Dupré of St. Clement :

If I could just correct the Deputy , it was a Ministerial team who decided about the fee-paying schools, as reported by our officers but it was a Ministerial decision.

Deputy S. Power:

Am I allowed to correct one comment Deputy Martin said, she accused me of being naïve. There are 4 examples of people who left the private sector to go in the public sector. That is, at the moment, the Bailiff , the Deputy Bailiff , the Attorney General and the Solicitor General. They all left private practice for public service.

11. Deputy I.J. Gorst of St. Clement :

I am just challenged to rise by the turn of events of the last couple of speakers, which seem to epitomise their "woe is me, woe are we" and that it does not really matter, everything is terrible, we are not going to be able to deal with problems. I want to congratulate the Deputy , I recognise that it is not an easy job and it is not going to be an easy job for the States Employment Board because as with all arguments and all policies that we wish to develop to address the issues of our community, they have to be nuanced and we have to look at evidence and we have to come forward sometimes with ideas that, in the fullness of time, need to be amended to deal with issues that arise. I would, however, agree with Deputy Martin when it comes to interim appointments. I think what the Comptroller and Auditor General is talking about is the transformation of an interim to a fixed term contract and that is where he shed his light and suggested we could have done things better there. I am sure the States Employment Board will take up on that. But there can be no doubt that there is a positive role for interims in the State sector. Inevitably those interims are more expensive, we are talking now hundreds if not thousands of pounds a day even to consider a financial professional to come in and work in departments. They say they are expensive, we have to recognise that but providing we recognise that, providing that is part of our acceptable policy and we have made that informed decision that that is what we are going to do, then we should not have a problem with that. It is where these things are not appropriately considered, they are not part of our policy and we are not in control of that policy. That is where the issue is. I do congratulate the Deputy , I hope this will be the first step in moving forward on some of these issues and that we will be able to deal with them in a positive and proactive way.

12. Deputy M.R. Higgins of St. Helier :

Just very briefly, as most of it has already been said, I just want to say first of all that I, like many members of the public, and many Members of this House, do feel that some of the salaries being paid to some of our senior civil servants are not simply just large, they are obscene. According to the Comptroller and Auditor General, he says it is just one appointment. I do not believe that. I can think of one senior person working .. I am going to talk widely here, not necessarily a civil servant, but working in the public sector, who moved from a salary of £110,000, working in the public sector, to a salary of £250,000-odd overnight. Now, was that person more knowledgeable, more qualified, more capable, that he justified a salary increase of £140,000 overnight? No, not at all. It is the system, and so what I would say is, although there are people who are very able and very capable, not everybody is motivated by money. I do not believe for a moment that individual would not have done the job that he has moved into for £120,000, a £10,000 increase. £140,000 was just a great bonus, if you can get it great. But the point is people are not simply motivated by money, and I almost feel that the senior Civil Service has become corrupted, corrupted in the sense they look at their private sector colleagues and think: "I want the same", and who are the people who are determining these salaries? Very often, it is like Deputy Le Hérissier was just saying about remuneration committees, it is the same people who are moving [Interruption] .. no, I will not sit down. The point is that these same people are determining the salaries of their colleagues, and we have to find a better system. Again, I was listening to much of what was said about Hay. A lot of it is rubbish. Many, many years ago I was trained as an evaluator in the Hay system, and I can tell you the system can be manipulated any way up and down, and the key factors are the number of people you have working for you and budget. You control the budget you are going to get the highest possible score, because every manager underneath you cannot claim that he controls the budget, only one person controls the budget, the person at the top of the tree. So the more people you have in your department, so empire building is great if you can do it, if you can bring in extra people, you can change titles, you can restructure, there are all sorts of things you can do. So a trained Hay evaluator and the experts can do it - and I have seen it in practice - if they wanted to destroy someone's job they can knock it down, if they wanted to build it up they can build it up, it is quite easy. So do not believe that Hay is the answer to this necessarily. Now what I would say is that I am not in the process of just bashing civil servants, I am not. I have worked in both the public and private sectors and I have admiration for people in both, there has been some really dedicated people, hard-working people. But equally you have the others who are lazy and manipulative or are simply driven by personal ambition, and those people will try and get to the top of any organisation anyway they can, over any bodies they can. Now they are the people that I do not want to see in the public sector, I still believe in public service and I do believe, going back to what Deputy Power said earlier, we have to take control of our own system. I really do believe that this Chamber and States Members do not control the public sector; it is controlled by the senior Civil Service who are looking after their own. So I shall be supporting this proposition even though, like everyone else, I am not convinced it is going to deal with the matter at all, but it is a step in the right direction.