States Meeting Transcript - 9th July 2014

STATES OF JERSEY OFFICIAL REPORT WEDNESDAY, 9th JULY 2014

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

1. States owned or controlled companies: rights and responsibilities (P.100/2014)........4

1.1 Deputy G.C.L. Baudains of St. Clement : ................................................4

1. Deputy R.G. Le Hérissier of St. Saviour:................................................6
2. Deputy S.G. Luce of St. Martin : .........................................................8
3. Senator S.C. Ferguson:..................................................................8
4. Senator P.F.C. Ozouf :..................................................................10
5. Deputy R.C. Duhamel of St. Saviour:..................................................15
6. Deputy G.P. Southern :..................................................................17
7. Connétable P.J. Rondel of St. John : ....................................................18
8. Senator A. Breckon: ....................................................................20
9. Deputy J.H. Young of St. Brelade:......................................................23
10. Deputy J.G. Reed of St. Ouen : ......................................................25
11. Senator L.J. Farnham : ...............................................................25
12. Senator A.J.H. Maclean:.............................................................26
13. Deputy S.Power:....................................................................28
14. Deputy E.J. Noel of St. Lawrence : ..................................................30
15. Deputy G.C.L. Baudains: ............................................................30

2. Draft Health Insurance (Performers List for General Medical Practitioners) (Jersey) Regulations 201- (P.110/2014)...........................................................33

1. Deputy A.E. Pryke of Trinity (The Minister for Health and Social Services):...........33

1. Deputy J.A. Hilton of St. Helier:........................................................35
2. Deputy G.C.L. Baudains:...............................................................35
3. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:............................................................35
4. The Deputy of Trinity :..................................................................36

2. The Deputy of Trinity :..................................................................37
3. The Deputy of Trinity :..................................................................37

3. Draft Residential Tenancy (Deposit Scheme) (Jersey) Regulations 201- (P.111/2014): amendment - reduce lodging period to consider at present meeting...................37

3.1 Deputy A.K.F. Green of St. Helier (The Minister for Housing):........................37

3.1.1 Deputy G.P. Southern :..................................................................38

4. Draft Medical Practitioners (Registration) (Amendment No. 4) (Jersey) Law 2011 (Appointed Day) Act 201- (P.114/2014).................................................39

4.1 The Deputy of Trinity (The Minister for Health and Social Services):..................39

5. Draft Proceeds of Crime and Terrorism (Tipping-Off Exceptions) (Jersey) Regulations 201- (P.112/2014............................................................40

1. Senator P.F.C. Ozouf (Assistant Chief Minister - rapporteur):..........................40
2. Senator P.F.C. Ozouf :..................................................................41

6. Draft Proceeds of Crime and Terrorism (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Jersey) Law 2014 (Appointed Day) Act 201- (P.117/2014).................................................41

6.1 Senator P.F.C. Ozouf (Assistant Chief Minister - rapporteur):..........................41

LUNCHEON ADJOURNMENT PROPOSED..................................................42 LUNCHEON ADJOURNMENT................................................................42

7. Draft Residential Tenancy (Deposit Scheme) (Jersey) Regulations 201- (P.111/2014)42

1. Deputy A.K.F. Green (The Minister for Housing):......................................42

1. Senator A. Breckon: ....................................................................45
2. The Connétable of St. John:............................................................46
3. Deputy G.C.L. Baudains:...............................................................46
4. Deputy G.P. Southern :..................................................................46
5. Senator B.I. Le Marquand:..............................................................46
6. Deputy S.Y. Mézec of St. Helier:.......................................................47
7. Deputy M. Tadier of St. Brelade:.......................................................48
8. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:............................................................48
9. Deputy J.H. Young:....................................................................49
10. Deputy N.B. Le Cornu of St. Helier : ................................................50
11. The Deputy of St. Ouen:.............................................................50
12. The Deputy of St. Martin : ...........................................................51
13. Deputy A.K.F. Green:...............................................................51

2. Deputy A.K.F. Green:..................................................................54

1. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:............................................................54
2. Deputy M. Tadier :......................................................................54
3. Deputy A.K.F. Green:..................................................................55

3. Deputy A.K.F. Green:..................................................................57

8. Draft Criminal Justice (Life Sentences) (Jersey) Law 201- (P.113/2014) - deferral...57
9. Draft Social Security (Bonus) (Jersey) Law 201- (P.82/2014)..........................58

1. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley (The Minister for Social Security): ........................58
   2. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:............................................................59

10. Redundancy Payments: businesses which have ceased trading (P.120/2014)..........61

10.1 Deputy G.P. Southern :..................................................................61

1. Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:........................................................63
2. Senator A. Breckon:.................................................................64
3. Deputy J.H. Young: .................................................................65
4. Senator I.J. Gorst : ...................................................................65
5. Deputy G.P. Southern : ..............................................................66

ARRANGEMENT OF PUBLIC BUSINESS FOR FUTURE MEETINGS ....................66

11. Deputy J.M. Maçon of St. Saviour (Chairman, Privileges and Procedures Committee): 67

1. Senator I.J. Gorst :......................................................................67
2. Deputy J.H. Young:....................................................................67

3. Senator L.J. Farnham :..................................................................68

1. The Deputy of St. Martin : ...........................................................68
2. Deputy J.H. Young: .................................................................68

4. Senator I.J. Gorst :......................................................................69
5. The Deputy of Trinity :..................................................................69
6. Senator P.F.C. Ozouf :..................................................................70

11.6.1 Senator A. Breckon:.................................................................70

7. Senator A. Breckon: ....................................................................70

11.7.1 Senator P.F.C. Ozouf : ...............................................................71

ADJOURNMENT................................................................................71

[9:30]

The Roll was called and the Dean led the Assembly in Prayer.

PUBLIC BUSINESS – resumption

1. States owned or controlled companies: rights and responsibilities (P.100/2014) The Bailiff :

We come back to the Order Paper and the next matter is Projet 100 - States owned or controlled companies: rights and responsibilities - lodged by Deputy Baudains and I will ask the Greffier to read the proposition.

The Greffier of the States:

The States are asked to decide whether they are of opinion (a) to agree that appropriate amendments should be made to the Public Finances (Jersey) Law 2005 to provide that responsibility for exercising the rights and responsibilities associated with the shares owned by the States in any company, which is currently vested in the Minister for Treasury and Resources alone in accordance with the provisions of Article 68(1) of the Law, should in future be vested in a new panel chaired by the Minister and comprising one Assistant Minister and 2 States Members who are not Ministers or Assistant Ministers appointed by the States; and (b) to request the Minister for Treasury and Resources to bring forward for approval the necessary amendments to legislation to give effect to the proposal."

1.1 Deputy G.C.L. Baudains of St. Clement :

I have got around to this at long last. I would just mention, I do not know now long Deputy Le Hérissier is able to stay with us today but I think it is unfortunate. I did accede to a request from Senator Ozouf last week to defer the debate because he was unable to be here but now it transpires that Deputy Le Hérissier is otherwise engaged during the day and has consequently had to withdraw his amendment, which I think is unfortunate. The reason I am bringing this is because first of all, I think what we really need to do is question the present template we use when incorporating areas of government that were previously administered by States committees, whether it is the most appropriate one because whenever incorporation is proposed much is made of the potential benefits but we only really discover the disadvantages later on. As an example, it was just a couple of weeks ago we decided to incorporate Housing, which was previously administered by politicians who did so as part of their work and were fully accountable to this Assembly. It will now be undertaken by a board which is effectively a committee by another name. It will be populated by people who require a salary and who are effectively unaccountable. I recall during that debate the Minister for Treasury and Resources commenting that a board would be far superior to the old committee because it was the latter who had let the properties deteriorate. I think I mentioned at the time the reason they deteriorated is because the committee had been starved of funds under the Fundamental Spending Review while a new board will benefit from hundreds of millions of pounds. It is not comparing like with like. There is no doubt the board will, I have every confidence - and like others I will come to in a moment - will come under the watchful eye of the Minister for Treasury and Resources in his position of shareholder representative. However, while that may look after the interests of the public on whose behalf we and he act, it is done at a high level and does not cover the areas which are crying out to be covered, as the Minister for Treasury and Resources does not get involved in day-to-day administration and rightly so. But that, in turn, creates a huge accountability gap which did not exist before and that is what my proposition is intended to address. As Members will recall, many questions have been asked of the Minister for Treasury and Resources in the recent weeks or months regarding certain utilities. We really have not made a great deal of progress because as we learn from the Minister's comments to my proposition, he is proud of the Memorandum of Understanding that he has with these companies but, of course, what he is doing, and rightly so, is ensuring that the companies produce the maximum amount of profit that they can, that the value of the company is enhanced wherever possible. No problem with that. But who is taking care of the customers? What happens is that the Minister does not get involved in the plight of thousands of customers that get caught up in this accountability vacuum surrounding the utilities, many of which are, of course, monopolies. This is a recurring theme, as I made clear in the report accompanying my proposition. We did lose, in my view, a substantial amount of accountability when we moved from committee to Ministerial. The companies or incorporated entities that we created are at arm's length and, in fact, company law does not allow us to interfere in the running of them. All very well and good but when you have a utility - as I have said, in most cases, monopoly - how do you ensure the customers are receiving a fair deal and more importantly any problems they have are properly dealt with? The truth is, at present one cannot. Of course, I fully appreciate that a fair deal will normally be an issue for the regulator but he, rather like the Minister for Treasury and Resources, operates at a high level and does not concern himself with day-to-day operational issues. This is important. This is the crux of the matter because many cases of customer dissatisfaction would be regarded by any company as minor issues but they are major issues as far as the customer is concerned.

[9:45]

Sadly, because of obviously being a monopoly - a lack of competition - many utilities do not respond to customer complaints the way that other businesses with competitors would. The customers are basically left with no one to turn to. That is where I would disagree with the Minister for Treasury and Resources because he has described the bad old days of committee when in actual fact in, this regard things, were better because if issues were not resolved by the department fairly quickly, they would be referred to committee and the fact that politicians could be held to account for operational issues meant problems were unlikely to be left unresolved for very long. We have lost that. Now we are faced with a question: "Where does the buck stop?" If I give an example where a tenant of the new Housing Committee has a problem it will usually be something simple, a window will not close, a neighbour's dog barks, someone has damaged the door. Major issues as far as that tenant is concerned. Will the company resolve the issues speedily? At present the Housing Department does, and I hope the new company will but we do not know. The point is where does a tenant go if they do not? The regulator cannot help nor can the Minister for Treasury and Resources. I have said before that the mere ability to be able to ratchet-up unresolved problems previously meant that they never got to that stage anyway. We have lost that with incorporation and that is a gap we have to fill. As I also mentioned in my report, obviously some utilities are more exposed to this problem than others. For example, customers of the J.E.C. (Jersey Electricity Company), Waterworks and the like are only likely to face issues of continuity of supply and price and issues like that and both those are currently able to be dealt with. But, of course, some other service providers are not so easily dealt with. Members will be aware of the problems customers have had with Jersey Telecom over the past year or so. I am not going to go into a lot of detail. I could speak for hours on that but there is a great deal of dissatisfaction over a whole raft of issues. But there are 2 common denominators underlying this. Firstly, it is becoming obvious that the company has become self-serving. They are not interested in the inconvenience customers face by introducing fibre into the home or any of the other problems they have been facing. The company no longer accepts payment by cheque; it does not even take cash at the counter. This is a blatant example, in my view, of acting in their own interests and the customer just has to put up with it. There is no customer service. As an example, over a month ago - 5 or 6 weeks ago now - I wrote to the company seeking clarification of charges and I am still waiting for the reply. Secondly, those of us who have taken up the baton on behalf of disgruntled customers are aware there is no way of bringing pressure to bear to force the company into resolving customer issues which we were able to previously. We asked the Minister for Treasury and Resources .. as I have said, we asked questions of the Minister for Treasury and Resources but as shareholder representative, operational issues do not concern him. Frankly, again I mention in my report, I think in the case of Jersey Telecom I think he should be because given the amount of customer dissatisfaction with that particular entity I fear he may find the company's value diminishes when its customers transfer to alternative providers which, once the regulator has finally got his act together, will make a large difference. We have mentioned the regulator. We have tried to get satisfaction via the Minister for Economic Development in his capacity of regulator overseer but unfortunately again, we have seen the regulator operates in the bandwidths between impotent and weary. There is no help there. The regulator, like the Minister for Treasury and Resources works at a high level; it is not his concern if your telephone does not work properly or your front door will not close. These are not regulator issues. In fact, the problem is it has become nobody's issue. People have to put up with unsatisfactory service because politicians have lost the ability to intervene. In my view there are potentially even greater problems over the horizon assuming, that is, that Harbours and Airport become incorporated because I believe that has the potential to be the biggest cause of frustration of them all. It is concerning because when it comes, all these incorporated States bodies, there is now no way a politician can represent his or her public to take up issues on their behalf. I became a States Member to help people, not to have to tell them: "I am sorry, there is nothing I can do." So today we have an opportunity to fill the accountability void created when we incorporated services previously managed by politicians. We need the tools to do the job, tools that we had previously which were taken away. We need a politician or politicians we can at least question in this Assembly regarding operational issues. In that way at least some degree of accountability will be restored. Again, as I mentioned in my report, it is a difficult one to resolve and I considered several options before deciding on the structure that I am proposing. One of the main contenders obviously was an ombudsman but I discounted that mainly for 2 reasons: there would undoubtedly be a cost involved and it is certainly doubtful, in my view, that resolution of customers' problems would be immediate enough. Taking my previous example of a housing tenant, if currently the department does not act and I have to say in my experience Housing are excellent. But if they do not act, all that is usually required is a phone call or email from a politician to get satisfaction. Would an ombudsman be able to act that quickly? I do not know. So what I have tried to do is to extend the powers that the Minister for Treasury and Resources currently has and, mindful of his workload, include other politicians to form a small panel and my hope is that members of that panel would forge a working relationship with the companies involved and by virtue of being politicians, be easily contactable by the public or indeed other States Members whenever a problem arose. That way, hopefully all it would take to resolve an issue a company may not be dealing with expeditiously enough or at all would be a call from a panel member to the company concerned in much the same way a person or politician contacts a department on behalf of a constituent. That, in my view, will improve customer service instead of at present the unsatisfactory situation where a company can, if it so wishes, do what it likes and politicians are unable to help those members of the public seeking their assistance. So I make the

proposition and will attempt to answer any questions. The Bailiff :

Is the proposition seconded? [Seconded]

1. Deputy R.G. Le Hérissier of St. Saviour :

Yes, if I could speak, thank you. My emphasis is slightly different to Deputy Baudains in that I do think Members would represent the broader public interests and it would be about broader public issues. I think and indeed if one is to read the comments of the Minister my view is these

comments feed totally into support of Deputy Baudains' proposition. They achieve precisely the opposite effect that he is trying to achieve. He talks of committees as bodies where there might be irreconcilable opinions expressed, there might be different opinions. This is normal committee operation we are talking about. It is as if there is some strange world out there where if people express different views on committees the whole system of government will come crashing down. Quite the opposite. I do think this notion and I notice when you look for examples the P.A.C. (Public Accounts Committee) report which is at the end of the Minister's comments, there is this movement between the word "States" and the word "Minister". Well, the Minister is only operating on behalf of the States. He has somehow to reflect those views. How does the Minister, having run a policy in the last few months, for example, in deflecting Deputy Baudains' questions - because that is largely what the policy has been - absorb the view of the States? How does he determine under the Memorandum of Understanding, which he quite rightly says govern the relationships? How does he determine what the public interest is? It is the view of one person. That is essentially what it is and the checks and balances are views from within the Treasury, so it is the Treasury imposing checks and balances on itself and that is never, never a healthy organisational way to operate. To take some examples, the Minister says: "I set them out and then I.. it is a private organisation" and yet, he has a major responsibility for setting the direction of that organisation and then once having set it, through the Memorandum, he draws back, But yet he then says: "Oh, we have got to give them commercial freedom" but one of the things, for example, that has occurred with Jersey Telecom is they have got massive involvement in the international sphere and you have to ask yourself, there is a famous management axiom from In Search of Excellence which says: "Concentrate on the knitting." In other words, concentrate on what you are really about and when you are having massive difficulties with your billing system, when you are introducing systems that are starting to alienate the public and so forth; who gave permission? Is it done through the Memorandum of Understanding? Who gave permission that J.T. (Jersey Telecom), for example, was to embark on massive international ventures? It all sounds very good but that is not the issue. The other issue and we as a States are partly to blame, and it has been reflected in emails which Members have received recently, which Deputy Baudains received in very great numbers from a certain gentleman, but he has some very good points. One of them is we never really thought through the process of what we would do with J.T. when we decided to keep it as a States-owned entity because it was allowed to keep control over the infrastructure and we now see the almost impossible tensions which that has set up. We have seen the almost farce of the court cases. We saw a previous court case on number portability where vast sums of money were essentially spent to delay an inevitable decision, to delay an inevitable decision. We have similarly seen a recent court case where it was simply delaying rather than attacking a matter of substance. But by allowing J.T. to keep control over the infrastructure and not be a true competitor with the other operators in Jersey we have set up an almost impossible tension and that is the sort of issue I would have thought that the Minister would have been seeking to resolve, to separate out the infrastructure issues of J.T. from the service provision issues. Whereas we now see this case that is rolling on of the fixed line system where people cannot get access to it, where progress has been unbelievably slow, where the only liberalisation that apparently has occurred with the Competition Authority is over single lines rather than multiple lines, for example, which makes it almost impossible for these other companies, including the one that we have heard about quite a lot recently. It makes it impossible for them to break-in and also it is impossible for these companies to retain commercial confidentiality when, in approaching J.T. as the infrastructure provider, they have to give an awful lot of information which essentially undermines their competitive position. That issue has never been resolved. In my view, the Minister has never faced up to it and he has never said: "Look there are real issues with the way we have set up this structure. It has tilted the balance far too much in this case" and good luck to J.T., they have got the freedom. It has tilted the balance far too much in their favour and led to this situation. But overall, what is the main objection in my view is this total void that the Minister is beavering away representing the public interest. I just do not know where he gets his concept of the public interest. I would have thought, as Deputy Baudains is suggesting, to have 3 or 4 States Members who can say: "These are the issues." They will be presented with the thinking of the utilities and they will respond to them. What can be wrong with that? What can be wrong? Instead of one person operating in total isolation under Memoranda of Understanding, which his own department are monitoring, formulating and apparently modifying as need be. What can be wrong with a group of people working with the Minister and if there are, as he says in his comments, differences of opinion, what is the problem?

[10:00]

That is the whole purpose of setting up a group; that there are differences of opinion that people have healthy arguments; that his thinking is teased out. At the moment, I mean, we know in a way, because of the Senator's ideological position, where he stands but in terms of detailed oversight of the position what is the problem in teasing-out where he stands and asking him or her fundamental questions? I would have thought that is incredibly healthy. So for all those reasons I thing we probably got it wrong as to how we managed these utilities. We concentrated far too much power, irrespective of the enormous energy, which we all respect, of the Minister for Treasury and Resources. We have concentrated far too much power in the hands of the Minister for Treasury and Resources and allowed far too many debates that should be open debates to be held under the surface and that is why occasionally they pop up these incredible issues where quite clearly things are going wrong, but we as Members cannot deal with it because of the almost surreptitious form of accountability that apparently controls this situation. Thank you.

2. Deputy S.G. Luce of St. Martin :

I have to rise and disagree with the first 2 speakers on a number of issues that they have already raised. The first one is the billing system. Members need to realise that the old billing system that Jersey Telecom used was defunct. It had to be replaced. They realised that the new billing system was not going to be perfect; it was going to give them difficulties. They are overcoming those. They send out an enormous number of bills on a daily basis and it would be my view that the number of complaints they get about those bills is very, very small. There is laughter in the Chamber but I think if you saw the percentages, we might be surprised. Very recently, the week before last if I recollect it correctly, Jersey Telecom put on a presentation to States Members. I was embarrassed that I was one of only 5 States Members that attended; one of those 5 being the Minister responsible. It was a very professional presentation. It is one that I look forward to going to on an annual basis, mainly because it gives me the ability to see how well Jersey Telecom are run, the profits they are making. I find it a really good presentation. Once again, this year we saw that they are now making more money from the business they do off-Island than the business they do on-Island. This is money. This is profit which is returned via a dividend to the Minister for Treasury and Resources for the Treasury to administer, to use for the benefit of Islanders. Why are we not more proud of our States-owned utilities? Why are we not more enthusiastic? Why do we not encourage them more? This is a company that is owned by us for our benefit. We should be allowing them to make more profit on the basis that profit is returned to us for us to use for the benefit of Islanders. Deputy Baudains mentions the lost ability of States Members to resolve issues speedily and the inability now of politicians to intervene with State-owned utilities. I have to say to Members this is not my personal experience. I have had dealings with the Electricity Company, with the Water Company and with Jersey Telecom on constituents' and other Islands' behalf and I have to say that in every occurrence I have had speedy success in resolving issues. I urge Members

to think carefully about this proposition. Thank you.

3. Senator S.C. Ferguson:

I would like to have been at that presentation. Unfortunately, like many Members, we had prior engagements which had been arranged with us long before we got the note about J.T. One of the problems we have to cope with is that everything is dressed up as commercial confidentiality, and: "We cannot tell you everything." You have to have a cut-down set of the accounts because otherwise it is commercial confidentiality. I do think there is a conflict of interest regarding the shareholdings because obviously it appears that the Minister for Treasury and Resources, and he no doubt will confirm this to us, seems to be requiring as much return as possible. But this is not necessarily in the long term or even the short term in the best result for the public. There needs to be a balance. Every now and again we get the comment coming that we cannot afford to carry on with the cheap rate fixed line for the oldies. I am sorry, the more mature members of society. Sorry, senior citizens. Sadly, I must confess to a conflict of interest here because I myself have one of these lines. But there is no true competition because in a number of aspects there is a monopoly situation with the utilities. With J.T. we have got the multiple and the fixed line problem which has been alluded to by Deputy Le Hérissier and, in fact, I should say that the Minister for Economic Development and I will be attending a meeting with J.T. regarding various aspects of their dealing with the local community. Now, Jersey Water and Jersey Electricity have significant minority shareholdings which are independent. J.E: Jersey Electricity is publicly quoted on the London Stock Exchange and therefore there is another set of checks and balances; and Jersey Water is quoted locally. Therefore although these are monopolies there is a check and balance with the independent shareholders. The position of J.T. does not afford this control. In fact, although the accounts have been .. or the summary accounts have been published, I notice that the 2013 figures required to be published by the regulator which split out the wholesale and retail dealings are not yet on the website, and it is well over halfway through the year. Over the past 2 years - well, 2011, 2012 - the main profit of the company has come from their wholesale activities. They make profits on the line usage, on the call usage for retail, but not on any of the other aspects in their retail dealings. These figures are .. if you go on to the website and look for regulatory matters, you will find the figures for 2011 and 2012. I have also started looking at download data charges. I question the pricing being loaded on this. Again, I shall be raising this at our meeting because in the U.K. (United Kingdom) where there is true competition it is possible to have unlimited download available. The download charges here, if you download television or films or anything, which is becoming commonplace, if you download those before midnight, then your telephone bill goes up significantly. In fact, I have put a bar on my son downloading before midnight because my bill was going up by leaps and bounds. The recent rationalisation on broadband has increased costs for those in the bottom level tariffs. This is unreasonable. Many of these people will not require

the additional facilities provided. They do not want a lot of download. They just want to be able to do a few emails and stuff like that. Apropos the activities of J.T., the international activities of Jersey Telecom, we do not, as I have said, as a matter of course, get full accounts and it is not totally clear as to how profitable the international operations are. Now a few years ago, certainly the biggest part of their revenue came from their international operations but whether that is the same as profit, as we all know it is not the same as profit. But should we be in the dark over this? As I say, I have questions for this particular company at our meeting on this and the fixed single and multiple line position which has already been quoted. I think to have a spread of views looking at the operation and the public interest on the utilities is no bad thing and I will be supporting the proposition.

Senator F. du H. Le Gresley:

Sir, could I just seek some guidance from you because we have just had 3 speeches which only talk about Jersey Telecom. I thought the proposition was completely different to that.

The Bailiff :

Yes. The proposition relates to all the companies. Senator Ozouf .

4. Senator P.F.C. Ozouf :

I have tried to find something to agree with with the last 3 speeches because I have heard an awful lot of criticism. I have heard some things that I recognise; I am not going to use the word "sympathy with" because it is the wrong word, but I recognise the issue and I have been trying to find something that I really agree with. I will start by being positive and say that I absolutely agree with one thing that Senator Ferguson said in respect of the 2 entities that she made a fleeting remark about, which was Jersey Water and Jersey Electricity. In the last 2 weeks the Assistant Minister and I have held all of the A.G.M.s (Annual General Meetings) with all of the entities and we have used that .. A.G.M.s do not take very long; they take literally minutes and then we have one of our regular dialogues of meetings. It is fair to say that both Jersey Electricity and Jersey Water have got minority shareholders which do perform a valuable role. I will come back to that later. I would observe also that this debate is being characterised as simply one and again there is some very .. if I may say there is .. they are not necessarily confused but Deputy Baudains and Deputy Le Hérissier are coming from 2 different directions and Senator Ferguson is also coming at it from a third direction. All of these directions appear to be now eliding in the middle with a single solution of effectively putting in a committee. There is no doubt that these are really important issues and they are really important issues for the Island, for this Assembly and for Ministers. This is not a debate and should not be a debate if Members know their facts. I am sure they know their facts because I am sure they have read the comments that have been given and that they read the underlying laws, and many of the Members of this Assembly were there when we set up many of the arrangements. This is simply not and should not be characterised as a single point of responsibility and a single almost decision-maker in being whoever the person the Minister for Treasury and Resources is. Because that is not how the arrangements work. There are multiple levels and there are different Ministers that are responsible for different areas of some of the problems. Deputy Baudains, I think it is fair to say and I think that he would freely admit and

of course, in an open society and in an open democracy and in a Parliament we are free to disagree. Now Deputy Baudains, I think, would like generally to go back to committee government. He has brought a proposition, P.157, and that was effectively defeated. We debated it. There were 16 votes in favour and he wanted to move back to committee system and that is a fair view. That is what he thinks and if he thinks that that is the way forward then he is entitled to have those views. This is a proposition which is a partial rerun of that debate, to move some of the old responsibilities of committees that moved to the Ministerial system back off to a committee. I also note that Deputy Baudains, quite rightly, has asked lots of questions about utilities. He has asked 10 questions on J.T. since the start of 2013 and 2 on the J.E.C. and these issues are clearly important for the Deputy . The majority of the questions that he has asked me, and indeed, much of his speech focused on the really important issue of customer service and customer satisfaction, and many of the questions that he has asked me in this Assembly are areas such as the company's acceptance of cheques, and these individual issues in relation to the billing system.

[10:15]

Now, I think to move problems at what I would describe, and Deputy Baudains would not, I think, agree to describe levels of fairly operational matters equating to a wholesale governance change with huge implications to the boards, all of which the boards, which this Assembly has mandated them to deal with the operational issues, are I think to equate problems in some areas and in one company to a wholesale reorganisation of the governance arrangement for utilities would be a very dramatic jump and I think would be wrong. Effectively it would be equating some customer service experiences which are real and problematic and needed to be fixed, with an overall conclusion that there is a fundamental failure of the governance arrangements with the shareholder.

All companies and utilities should have proper processes to first of all avoid customer bad experiences and then dealing with customers' complaints. With the greatest of respect, I do not think that day-to-day problems, and Deputy Baudains used those words, day-to-day problems of customers should be time taken in this Assembly every 2 weeks. I think we are here - and I will come to the important issues that Deputy Le Hérissier makes - to be legislators, to be overall strategic policy confirmers at a very high level enjoinder and to ensure accountability. All of the entities Senator Le Gresley was right to say that a lot of the comments are about J.T. J.T. seems to be .. certainly it is the most valuable entity. It is the entity that is going through most change. It is the entity that is having the most amount of capital projects going on at the moment, fibreing the Island, moving to a new billing system, together with a fundamental change in the way that telecommunications and data is being received and they are effectively the entity that this Assembly and Deputy Baudains and Members' comments mainly are concerned about. It was not always so though. It was Jersey Post that was the problem entity a couple of years ago and before then it was the J.E.C. because we had also Deputy Breckon using the 1937 Law for electricity. I have reflected and all entities will be .. just as there is a time and place when all Ministers get particular problem periods. We have all had them. They will continue to happen where public matters of importance are the real issues which are commanding public interest. Now with these entities, we have set up a structure and process including, and nobody has yet used the word "regulation". We have set up segregated responsibility to ensure that matters are dealt with properly and that matters are accountable. Companies have been incorporated and they have been put to some extent at arm's length from day-to-day operational control for good reason. They are commercial enterprises. They need to be allowed to invest, take business decisions in a fast- moving business environment and in a way that, if I may say, would be very problematic in a committee system which this does ask for. Deputy Baudains said: "Politicians have lost the ability to intervene." Well, I do not agree with that from an overall policy point of view, but politicians are not there to be good committee members, attending a Jersey Telecom board to speak about, and I have spoken with former politicians and former directors and former managers of days in which the old Telecommunication Board would have endless discussions about micro matters which, frankly, was not the best use of politicians' time. There was apparently a very long discussion at a certain time in the past about whether or not Jersey Post vans should be painted a certain colour. Well, I do not think that Members are elected in order to make operational decisions. Politicians

are here, and politics is about the really big strategic matters. We do have the ability to intervene. We do have issues that can be brought to the public's attention and this Assembly, on occasion, is the right place to bring serious failings, serious matters. Question time can be used and those serious problems, let me say to Members and it does not matter whether or not it is me or anybody else, if I have questions without notice and I have not been given knowledge of something that is going wrong in a Treasury Department or a States-owned entity and I am asked a question and it is not in my brief, then there are problems when I go back to the Treasury. I say: "Why do I not know about that? Why have you not fixed it? What is the problem?" So there is accountability that works, and I can say to Members that when I became Minister for Treasury and Resources I did believe - and I again make no criticism of my highly regarded predecessor, who had many other important issues - the Treasury at the time had got into a position where the relationship was too arm's length. The States ownership of entities must mean something otherwise we must simply either sell them, and I am interested to know that apparently Senator Ferguson might not think that because I thought that her politics might be that she would sell everything and that the free market would operate better entirely. She hinted at it because .. by saying that private shareholders would be better. My view is that national ownership means something and national ownership should mean that there is a linkage between the States overall plan and the Strategic Plan and what these entities are doing. I think for all sorts of reasons that is sensible. That is important for investment. We have seen utility companies in other places that have been privatised, and that are not in their government's ownership, under invest. They have seen their lights go out. They have seen their telecommunications not invested and they have seen their ability to compete, not in our neighbouring Islands although I note with interest that Guernsey Telecom was sold and Members can see for themselves the reality of the financial matters to do with that, and I will come to the concerns about whether or not the Treasury is simply wanting a return. Actually, J.T. is worth about £300 million if it were to be sold. I personally do not believe it should be sold. Each of these entities does have challenges and does have, from time to time, a requirement for an intense dialogue between Government and the entity themselves. Jersey Telecom is at that moment now. That is why we are working with J.T. and I hope going to be working very closely with the Minister for Economic Development, who has the responsibility of dealing with many of the questions that Senator Ferguson was raising. Now I do not quite know where the Minister for Economic Development is going to be in this world whereby there is a committee and simply then still the Minister for Economic Development is dealing with regulation. Does he need a committee as well to deal with the governance and what he is going to be dealing with the regulator? The regulator is not entirely independent either. There is accountability of the regulator and there have been issues, there has been learning, there have been problems on both ownership and the regulatory side. You, Sir, should not have been sitting over a court case between the J.C.R.A. (Jersey Competition Regulatory Authority) and J.T., and you rightly mentioned the waste of money. I hope I am permitted to say that. You are right, Sir. That was a matter which needed to be fixed, although I will say, on J.T.'s side that they won the case, but we should not have been in that position. But clearly, and again I say that I think there is a proper debate to be had about some of the issues that Deputy Le Hérissier raises about what to do with infrastructure. Many of the problems that Deputy Baudains is talking about is effectively retail service and I am poacher turned game keeper. When I became Minister for Treasury and Resources I wanted to be a more activist shareholder. I had chairmen of the entities thinking: "Goodness me. We are going to be told what to do by the Minister for Treasury and Resources." No. We have had a very good relationship where we have aligned States objectives, what this Assembly wants in a strategic plan much more closely in terms of what those entities should be. There are huge challenges that need to be put in place in relation to dealing with telecoms in the future. There is an absolute debate to be had about infrastructure, investment and retail competition. But we are not alone in that debate. There is a debate that needs to have happened all over the world about how to get investment. But setting up a committee is not going to solve these issues. Allowing Members, as Deputy Baudains says, to deal with the problems and to intervene on operational matters is not the solution. I have given substantial comments on these matters and I hope that Members would have learnt something, if I may respectfully say, for the M.O.U.s (Memoranda of Understanding) that had not previously been .. perhaps Members aware of exactly the granular nature of the way that the relationship works within those entities. The M.O.U. sets out how strategic planning works, how strategic plans will be approved. Budgets. It will be how reporting is made. That is strong governance. They define the dialogue that is expected, the issue of no surprises that I mentioned earlier. There should be no surprises. States Members and Ministers should not read something in the media of an important decision of a publicly-owned entity without pre-knowledge about it. Buying an acquisition, for example. That is why those no surprises are in place. So I see Senator Breckon's light on and I regret the fact that the debate on Broad Street has not yet happened but there we go, as a good example of whether or not the dialogue and accountability has worked. Jersey Post wanted to sell its Broad Street site. It was right because it was a reserved matter in the M.O.U.. Is that a problem, the fact that the previous Minister said that if you sell Broad Street please come and tell the shareholder? Was it right that there should be a dialogue with the Minister? Absolutely, and there was, and it happened properly. It was not possible to hide behind a committee. There was a single point of authority. There was a speediness and a quickness to dialogue which was possible because it was with a clear document with a clear accountability structure that worked. I also say, Jersey

[10:30]

He has been a regulator. He has worked for the U.K. Government and he has run a postal business. He is now running our postal business and is going to do a very good job. We spoke frankly about the implications of Deputy Baudains' proposition. Would it work? Could it work? I have some interesting things that I wish I could say in public about what that individual said about politicians' well-intentioned desires and stopping things happening will be. I am afraid that it is not possible and it should not be accepted that commercial entities are interfered with at an operational level inappropriately. It is simply a turning back to an old world that might have worked 20 or 30 years ago but will not serve customers, the Island or the public finances. Deputy Southern wants to speak. He may want to speak in terms of more nationalisation. He might want to talk about more control.

Deputy G.P. Southern of St. Helier :

Please do not put words into my mouth.

Senator P.F.C. Ozouf :

I said he may want to speak about it but he is remonstrating against my remark. The Bailiff :

There was nothing improper about those remarks.

Senator P.F.C. Ozouf :

I look forward to his observations but if he is going to say we need more State involvement I might agree with him on some matters but I also think we might need less in some areas. There is a debate to be had about J.T., about infrastructure, retail competition, access to the network. All is not right in relation to the Competition Authority and J.T's relationship. The Minister and I are committed with it being the accountable Ministers, not just the Minister for Treasury and Resources, of fixing that problem but it is a fast-moving world. If may come to the defence of J.T., Senator Ferguson said: "No, J.T. was not making any money from external sales before." Yes, they are. J.T. have produced some spectacular results as a result of leveraging a small market and building profit which ultimately means that taxpayers are in a better position and J.T. is in a more robust position. There is a debate to be had. This Assembly has accepted a lower dividend for J.T., so where is this argument about profit being the entire motive? We have accepted a lower dividend to invest in fibre. I was grateful to both the candidates at the time for Chief Minister, that said: "Yes get on with fibre", and that, I think, has been a prophetic decision which I believe is going to stand us well into the future. Technology is about everything of the future and it is vital that, in my view, we have a Jersey Telecom that can work properly. I do not want to speak long because this is a difficult debate and there will be people who will, no doubt, stand up and say some fairly forthright critical things of some State entities, which I will be uncomfortable with, but I will not have a second chance to say I regret some of the things that some Members criticise about some of the States entities. Some of the States-owned entities have hundreds of staff that are committed to delivering very high levels of customer service. It is one of the most pleasurable things that I do and other Members, of course, are also invited to go and see J.T., Jersey Water, Jersey Electricity; go to the power plant, meet staff, meet engineers at the coalface and see hard working staff. I met a member of J.T.'s staff by accident at the weekend and this individual, who I did not know, spoke about the disillusionment that J.T. staff feel when they are criticised in this Assembly. They feel pain and they feel as though they are almost ashamed of being J.T. staff because of some of the things that are said and I find that a matter of regret. So I would urge Members to please be sensitive. There are good hard working people in these entities working day-in day-out to deliver customer service and solving customer's problems. Yes, there are problems with putting a new box in everybody's house for fibre. Yes, some Members do not think that that is the right thing to do. I am sorry but I disagree and generally people think it is the right thing to do, which is going to be enabling us to deliver all sorts of other States objectives in terms of education, health care and a society and an economy of the future which is going to be able to deliver jobs and growth and economic activity in a way that otherwise would not be possible. So I say we cannot turn the clock back. We cannot turn the clock back to a Deputy Baudains committee. We need to move forward. There has been huge success in many of these entities. Jersey Electricity is working well, working efficiently. Jersey Water is working well and efficiently. Jersey Post is working brilliantly well after having a problem. Jersey Telecom is working well and profitably but there are challenges and a debate to be had and we need to continue to use the existing separation of responsibility of the shareholder and regulation, widen it; expand it, if necessary, at the appropriate levels. Yes, have a linkage to a strategic plan and to invite the entity to show what they are going to do to meet States objectives but please not to go to an old form of governance that would throw away the last 10

years of management, improvements, investment, and better value. I hear Members complaining. If Members are going to say that they want to go back to a world where Jersey Telecom did not deliver the kind of sophisticated services that they do today then I regret what Members are going to be saying. These are difficult issues and it is not appropriate for a States committee to be created to deal with them. I urge Members, this is going to be one of these strange debates again where I think there is going to be an alignment of all sorts of irreconcilable positions. Three Members wanting something completely different coming to a conclusion which is a complete dog's breakfast. I say to Senator Ferguson: "Look at what the P.A.C. say about governance." I say to Deputy Le Hérissier: "Yes, strategic plans need to be linked into overall States plans. We can do better than we have in the past because of what we have now got." I say to Deputy Baudains: "Nothing is ever going to persuade me", that means that States Members are here to deal with operational matters and give the ability to this Assembly to intervene into matters; I do not think elected Members are there. Work to be done, but this is not the solution.

Deputy G.P. Southern :

Point of clarification, if I may, of the previous speaker? When he referred to different Ministers responsible for different areas, was he only referring to the Minister for Economic Development and himself or was he meaning other Ministers have responsibilities?

Senator P.F.C. Ozouf :

I am conscious that I do not want to speak for too long but, no. The Minister for Housing is responsible for housing policy and we now have a good and excellent framework for Andium. We have the Minister for Transport and Technical Services and the Minister for Planning and Environment responsible for certain matters to do with Jersey Water. Only yesterday discussing nitrate issues with Jersey Water. Joint solutions. We have electricity; I held the board meeting of J.E.C. last night, a full Minister team, dealing with electricity matters, a future of electricity sustainability. We have the Minister for External Relations dealing with seabed issues. We have a Chief Minister responsible for overall matters. It is a multi-Ministerial involvement that needs to be, perhaps, seen in the context in which it is but not a committee, going back to the past.

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

I think that what we do here, whether we are ordinary Members or Executive Members of the Government, could be likened to being participants in a giant game, a giant game of Monopoly, and having analysed the game, in game theory terms, Members will not be surprised that if you wish to win Monopoly, to take over the world, then you must take over the utilities first. Unfortunately that really is what we appear to be doing in terms of the strategic direction of the utility companies. There is a huge difference between strategic direction of commercial entities that are wholly-owned or part-owned by the States and their commercial running. In order to give proper strategic direction there have to be proper mechanisms in order to give those directions but the directions should not be given just by one person and we just heard the Minister for Treasury and Resources, coming late to the argument, that perhaps we do have embryonic working practices that are going to deliver stronger methods of governance in order to ensure that the information flow in terms of strategic direction properly runs from the public through to the States and its Members, through its Ministers and the Government and down to any businesses in which we have a commercial interest. But we do not have that exactly at the moment and that, I think, is really the essence of Deputy Baudains' and Deputy Le Hérissier's comments so far. It is said that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, or as strong as its strongest link, but if that link is just the Minister for Treasury and Resources acting as the shareholder on behalf of the States then fundamentally we have a difficulty, in my view, in terms of the connectivity back through to the strategic direction that has to find its way properly forward from the public through the States and Ministers to those companies. So I think the Minister for Treasury and Resources is fundamentally wrong when he says that his world view is essentially black and white - his so-called binary options - and that going back, in any shape or form, to any committee style of government represents a wrong way forward. In this job - and I have mentioned it on previous occasions so Members will not be at all surprised - things are not necessarily black and white. They may well be at the extreme ends of the argument but we have to find working ways to come up with what is best for the majority. That means that in designing our chains, or designing our ropes perhaps, that is probably why we have multi-threaded ropes so that if any one particular linkage does not work then we have got a whole host of other links or linkages to rely upon. Some mention has been made that we do have a number of strategic issues that have not, in my view, been properly assessed by this working government over the last 3 years but we have made a start and we do have new governance organisations springing up and new challenges

in particular with housing, energy, water; harbours and airport is coming up on the inside rail. Some of the difficulties I had in supporting the move to transfer all of our properties into the new Andium company were based on this very point that we have to have very strong mechanisms in order to ensure that strategic direction, which is to be given to our property holding company in a different guise, to make sure that those issues are taken up and expressed by the company. So what have we done about it? We have set up a Strategic Working Group consisting of a number of Ministers and we have begun to sit down together to discuss some of these issues but fundamentally it still relies on the formation of those ideas being expressed through the Minister for Treasury and Resources as the fundamental shareholder to the Andium organisation. Indeed I thought it might have been possible - and I mentioned it in various places - that perhaps a better way forward would have been to have adopted something that is being suggested to us by Deputy Baudains today, that the instructions to be given to these commercial companies should be formulated by a group; we are going to call it a Strategic Housing Group. There is no difference in my mind to calling it a Strategic Housing Committee or whatever collective noun you wish to use. In essence, it is more than one person and that is the fundamental point.

[10:45]

I think having had the States move towards the creation of the Strategic Housing Group it is pretty clear in my mind that the comments that are being expressed by Deputy Baudains are being heeded. Harbours and Airports: and we are talking about commercialisation of that particular organisation, but there is still going to remain issues that previously had a States Working Group called the I cannot remember exactly what the name was, but it was a Transport Working Group that was interested in the transport linkages to and from the Island. It was headed by one States Member, but it was a group of people who looked at the strategic issues of transport to and from the Island. The very big things that any organisation running a harbour or an airport have to think about. There is a general interest to be expressed on behalf of all members of the public through this Assembly to those companies. Likewise, it was just mentioned about the other interested parties on behalf of Jersey Water. I have held talks with the Jersey Water executives under my remit at Planning, to look into the nitrate issues and other chemical pollution problems and indeed perhaps to have early talks in what T.T.S. (Transport and Technical Services) - if it is still here as a department in the future - might be wishing to consider which is the transfer of the sewage system to the water works company so that we have one body looking after a number of different areas for whatever reason. So that means that there are interested parties, other Ministers, who have to, on behalf of the public, express the longer term strategic issues in a way that these companies are expected to respond. Why are they expected to respond? Because we own them, or we own part of them, and that is the whole essence of the ownership. We have got similar issues - I will not go on too much further - with the Jersey Electricity Company and the opportunities that this Island might wish to avail itself of its renewable energy resources in terms that can be expressed perhaps in part or in full or in partnership with other bodies, through the electricity company. So all of this inevitably means that we are going to be reliant on the opinions of more than one person. So I am not particularly hung up to say that if you have the wrong person then you are going to have the wrong issues promoted but I think I would rather have organisational structures conceived that allows a multiplicity of opinion to be expressed and to be decided upon in a way that can be conveyed either through a single person, if that person is the chair of the group, no problem at all with the Minister for Treasury and Resources remaining as a chair of a policy-setting or a strategic policy-setting group, or any other person. So for me I think really we are about to reinvent a governance structure that served this Island for a number of years before we decided to change the names on the doors, and that was the Policy and Resources Committee. The Policy and Resources Committee in the past, if you read some of the papers, busied themselves with looking at the big issues, the really big issues, that this Government and this Island needs to get to grips with in a way that could be transferred sensibly down to any of the other organisational bodies that were required to bring into effect those common designs. One last point, I am a little bit worried when we have the Minister for Treasury and Resources suggesting that we do not have to worry too much perhaps - maybe I am paraphrasing what he is saying - about the reliance or being able to rely on

the functions of a Minister for Economic Development when perhaps discussions are already taking place as to what might happen in the future to remove the Economic Development Department as one of the departments under a new Government. A number of functions have already been shed from E.D.D. (Economic Development Department) and I think the writing is on the wall for that particular department and I think the Minister probably realises, and if he does not I think he soon will. We have been making functional changes to transfer different pieces of responsibility from some Ministers to other places and indeed that is one of the reasons why we have moved a lot of the property function out of the specific remit of the Minister for Housing and into a commercial company. So the future is going to be different, that is for sure, but I would like to think that we are a mature enough Assembly to take helpful propositions that do come from Back-Bencher Members from time to time to move us to a point where we can consider organisational structures and deficiencies in the proposals for how we operate our business in a way that I think is definitely useful and should be properly thought about and tried out. It has worked in the past and I see no reason with a strong wind behind us that our Members could not support wholeheartedly this proposition and satisfy ourselves that in doing so there would be an element of security in not putting too many eggs into one Ministerial basket.

6. Deputy G.P. Southern :

What are we talking about? We are talking about, for example, Jersey Post, Jersey Telecom, Jersey New Waterworks Company, more recently Andium Homes and in the future Jersey Ports. What are they? They are strategic assets to the Island, absolutely vital. Our communication mechanisms, our transport, our fundamental resources. They are strategic assets. Why do we want arm's length control over those? Why should we do that? Because it is surely essential to looking after our population that we keep hold of them. Why? Because if we incorporate them, not privatise them but incorporate them, then we put them at arm's length and we take some infrastructure costs, some capital costs, off the balance sheet, quite simply. We then say that in some cases we are introducing competition and competition brings down prices and the service will go up and the price will come down. Is there evidence that that ever happens? I would argue that is not the case and why is it not the case? Because the model used that competition brings, is a good thing intrinsically, brings down prices, does not work in a small economy because it is the Regulation that you need to control particular assets in order to make them work to the best interests of the public and that is what we should be concerned with. So let us have a look at the record. Let us start with Jersey Post. Jersey Post: in trouble some time ago. What happened to prices, did they come down? Price s went up. What happened to service level? Went down, collection was reduced, et cetera, no Saturday post. I just had my wife marking exam papers and comparing the times in which stuff gets to her without a Saturday post and stuff gets to the U.K. and hearing massive differences. So it nearly interfered with her ability to mark papers. What happened to the workforce? Well, the workforce got reduced. They were invited to apply for their own jobs minus 20 per cent of the old rates, so terms and conditions for workers went down. Jersey Telecom: similar sort of story really. They outsourced their cabling service and conditions went down. Now we have seen an additional factor, we have seen the arrival of the bonus culture. So they have got a chief officer on £190,000 with a bonus of £120,000. That is the sort of thing that is happening and an employer who used to be a model employer, in terms of its training and structures and its local contracts, now I hear using zero hours contracts in order to cheapen the service, reduce the costs of delivering a service but at the expense of its workforce. So not a particularly good model. Jersey New Waterworks Company: again, immediately outsourced its maintenance crew and there were a number of people made unemployed there and I do not know that standards have gone up, I doubt it very much. I suspect that it has gone down. Now we have Andium Homes where there is absolutely no clear I am asking the Minister for Housing where are the lines of accountability? When a decision is made either at Andium Homes or at the Gateway where is the mechanism through which you appeal that particular mechanism? Now, the Minister for Treasury and Resources, during his speech, he said one of his jobs - and I think it was a list of 3, but the third one - was to ensure accountability. Members in this House know the stock response we get from this Minister for Treasury and Resources to any questions about delivery of service from any of the utilities of which he is the representative of the States, the answer is, it is operational, you will get

nothing out of me. I will do nothing. So when we ask him about £120,000 bonus culture, what is that for, are we going to get some decent statement out of him as to what it is about and why it is justified or unjustified or what he is going to do about it? I doubt it. So accountability, singularly missing and that is something that I have found is important. Finally, I turn to Jersey Ports, which is in consultation at the moment but is going to happen, we all know it; it is going to be incorporated. What have we got there? Well, we have got yet again, no notice: Jersey New Waterworks employment issues, conditions; Jersey Post, conditions reduced; Jersey Telecom, conditions reduced. That is the common theme. It has not happened yet with Andium Homes. Do not hold your breath, it will happen eventually perhaps. Jersey Ports, serious issues there about terms and conditions. Again, always incorporation without any T.U.P.E. (Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment)) transfer of undertakings; protection for the workforce in place. Instead a code of practice, I think it is called T.O.P.S.E. (Transfer of Public Sector Employees), which is not enforceable. It is not statutory and again, I say, every time we incorporate terms and conditions go down. It is one of the ways of reducing cost and becoming, apparently, more efficient. It is not a very good way but it happens time and time again. It is about to happen again. No T.U.P.E. in place and without that I think some accountability is absolutely essential in terms of a single issue of treatment of the workforce and that accountability does not come from this Minister for Treasury and Resources but might come from 4 heads, which do not have to take an enormous length of time coming to a decision, but usually 4 heads will produce a better decision than one because more input, more directions, will go into that. So it is possible to get rapid and better decisions out of a small committee than it is out of one person, that is a reality and that is what I will be voting for.

7. Connétable P.J. Rondel of St. John :

Everyone seems to be majoring on Jersey Telecom. Yes, I did not attend their presentation the other week. I spent several, well more than several hours, with the department earlier this year after a number of issues that I had. Yes, we covered all sorts of things at that particular meeting including the billing, which is still not resolved in its entirety.

[11:00]

I suppose if you are spending many millions of pounds - many, many millions of pounds - on setting up a new billing centre off-Island then you are going to expect an awful lot of people down the far end, who do not know how the Island of Jersey works, are going to create problems especially when they do not know the local ins-and-outs of our island. Then, of course, we bring in outsiders to put in all the fibre optic equipment in our roads. They dig them up. I think the Deputy of St. Martin mentioned the boxes in each house, if not him it was the Minister for Treasury and Resources. Somebody mentioned it. These boxes are taking anything between 12 and 14 weeks in some cases to be wired-up to the telephones or to their computers or whatever they wire these things up to. There are all sorts of things still going on. I have got to find out the latest figure of how many houses are being connected to the fibre optic system. I know full well that it is my Rating Assembly this evening and one of the things I have had to do is - not had to do we are doing - within that is delaying the rates resurfacing of a number of our minor roads because Jersey Telecom, or the fibre optics teams, have still to go through them and we are not going to resurface roads until they have been though them but I am going to move on. I can see the Deputy of St. Martin and Minister for Treasury and Resources looking as if they are going to burst a seam. But that said I am not giving away, you had your 20 minutes on your feet, Minister.

The Bailiff :

Through the Chair, Connétable . The Connétable of St. John :

Yes. Thanks for reminding me. Yet again. But I am looking at the bigger picture of what we have, whether it is Jersey Post, Telecom, the Water Board, which in general have been running a good ship for many years although there have been one or 2 little hiccups with Jersey Electricity, but they have run a good ship since well before I was born. So we have got some stability in some of the companies. One or 2 of the new kids on the block, shall we say, have still got to grow their feathers. I am concerned in one area in particular, which is about to happen, and that is the ports because over recent months - it is years now since we have set up this shadow board - a lot of the responsibilities, shall we say, for the outlying harbours have been handed over in a big part to clubs or associations. I am just thinking of one in particular at Bouley Bay where one heck of a turmoil has happened down there in the last few months when a fisherman, who has a living to make, fell out with the local administration that has been put in place. This guy tried everywhere within both the Fishermen's Association and through the Harbours to get a result. I got involved and the poor chap finished up where Harbours eventually took him to court. The poor chap got fined £5,000 and in fact, poor lad, his health has suffered considerably and I feel sorry for him that the help was not there. This has been done because we want to corporatize a particular area. In this case it is the ports and there is not the close working relationship that was there when everything came under Harbours or under the Airport. You could get to the bottom of things much easier. The more we move away from, shall we say, hands-on to a point historically I could have spoken to the Harbour Master of the day and made things happen. It was far more difficult getting anywhere to get results to try and bring a bit of common sense to this particular scenario. Far more difficult. So much so, as I say, the way that things are being run, yes, it is another tick box; yes, we have done that, we have done that, okay, we now take the person to court. There are other ways of dealing with it including, in the first instance, yes, a Parish Hall Inquiry if need be and try and bring people together. Parish Hall Inquiries are very good for doing things like that, but that did not happen in this case but that is just one. People do get injured along the way whether it is our employees, whether it is people that we are responsible for. Do not forget we are all in this Chamber representing the people out there in the streets. They come to us as a last resort - a last resort - and we sometimes cannot help them because of the bureaucracy that we are putting in place. Whether it is the people with their telephone bills that cannot get them resolved. They spend 45 minutes on the telephone line trying to speak to somebody and they still do not get it resolved and this has been

a common complaint from many residents of this Island about the way they are being treated. Bring it to the Chamber, you raise questions with the Minister, he says: "Yes, no problem. I will get you to meet the department." I go and meet the department; because I am an elected Member, yes, they will put on some sandwiches for me to have lunch with them and, yes, everything is they take you around and show you how everything works but really getting to the bottom of things I have told a lot of people, ring the C.E.O. (Chief Executive Officer) up direct. Get hold of him. If you rattle his cage sufficiently then something might happen. They cannot even get through to the C.E.O.'s secretary let alone the C.E.O. What is happening? This is the kind of walls which we are building. We are building walls around these businesses so that the ordinary man in the street, all our people that elect us into this Chamber, are being affected one way or another. They are being affected. We put a billing system in place at Jersey Telecom. Several years ago - a number of years ago now - we used to pay our bills quarterly, as most companies did, all of a sudden they bring them forward to monthly billing. There is a cost implication there which we are paying for; yes, they want their money in quicker. We have had a recession that we are still well, we are just coming out of it. People have been paying through the nose for services, why, because they are pushing up the costs, billing people on a monthly basis when they could have been on a quarterly basis as before. All of a sudden now we are seeing our numbers rise in costs and really it is of concern. We have seen the services in other areas; where it has been mentioned by Deputy Southern the postal delivery is only done Monday to Fridays. If there is a bank holiday in a week or 2 bank holidays over a weekend, like Easter, you finish up with a 3-day service. Honestly,