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WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR EDUCATION, SPORT AND CULTURE
BY DEPUTY G.P. SOUTHERN OF ST. HELIER
ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON TUESDAY 1st MAY 2007
Question
- W o uld the Minister informmembers –
( i) w hat proportion of the £2.5 million required to fund the 2007 States employees' pay award his
department has had to absorb?
(i i) w hat measures have been taken to meet this additional cost?
(i ii ) w hether such actions amount to service cuts or delays in certain activities, and
- W o uld the Minister place these in context of measures already taken in responseto the need for efficiency savings for2007?
Answer
- (i ) The Education, Sport and Culture Department has had to absorb £973,700 of the 2007 States employees' pay award.The Council ofMinisters agreed further funding of £275,300, bringing the sum tobeabsorbedbythedepartment to £698,400.
(i i) In an attempt to reduce the impact to front line services, the full additional funding of £275,300 has
been allocated to schools. Despite this the schools will have to absorb the following sums:
Type of school Approximate shortfall in pay awards to be absorbed
One form entry Primary £7,000 - £8,000
Two form entry Primary £12,000 - £14,000 Three form entry Primary £16,000 - £18,000 Secondary £40,000 - £44,000
Other areas of the service have had to absorb the full shortfall in pay awards.
ii i) A lthough exact figures were not available, all managers were warned at the beginning of the year of
the possibility that they would have to meet a shortfall in pay awards from their own budgets. The 2007 budgets were adjusted to inflate the staff budgets for the anticipated pay awards. This was achieved by reducing non staff costs, calculating staff vacancy factors and reallocating to meet the pay award shortfall.
S ervice cuts and delays in certain activities have not been identified to meet the shortfall in pay
awards. However should managers be unable to operate within their reduced budget there is a possibility that they will have to take action such as delaying initiatives or possibly recruitment to avoid overspending in their area.
- E ff i c iency savings of £340,900were applied to the Education, Sport and Culture budget for 2007. These will beachieved through staff vacancies, increasing incomewithout increasing the associated costsof generating income, for examplesalesofactive cards and various small efficiency savings across the full range ofthedepartment's activities.
Areas have reviewed their processes and implemented efficiencies to save money, for example the Library has altered heating times, increased their ordering of paperbacks rather than hardbacks where possible and they are also attempting to generate more media coverage in an attempt to reduce advertising costs. Staff training has been reviewed and where possible in-house training has been encouraged, this has led to significant savings. Schools and other service areas are able to take advantage of corporate contracts for purchasing of goods and services and it is hoped that the scope of these savings will increase during the course of 2007.
It should be noted however that additional costs of utilities, for example, which the department has estimated will cost in the region of £250,000, will also have to be found from within existing resources. No additional funding has been allocated to schools or service areas to compensate for these additional costs.
With relatively small budgets for non-staff costs, most areas of the service have limited scope for achieving further efficiency savings over those already identified. Staff costs represent over 83 per cent of the department's gross budget excluding transfer payments (student grants and grants to other organisations).