Lime Grove House - Minister for Home Affairs and Deputy Chief Officer of Police - Transcript - 30 August 2011

STATES OF JERSEY

Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel Lime Grove House: Failure to Complete Transaction

TUESDAY, 30th AUGUST 2011

Panel:

Senator S.C. Ferguson(Chairman) Deputy D.J. De Sousa of St. Helier Deputy C.H. Egré of St. Peter

Witnesses:

Senator B.I. Le Marquand (The Minister for Home Affairs) Mr. B. Taylor ( Deputy Chief Officer of Police)

Also present:

Ms. K. Boydens (Scrutiny Officer)

Ms. S. McKee (Training Scrutiny Officer)

[10:02]

Senator S.C. Ferguson (Chairman):

Welcome to this meeting of the sub-panel of the Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel considering the Lime Grove House transaction. First of all there is a health warning. I do not know whether Mr. Taylor has been to one of our hearings before.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: I have, yes.

Senator S.C. Ferguson: It has not changed.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: Fine, thank you.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

I wonder if for the purposes of identification you could say who you are and what your position is.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I am Ian Le Marquand. I am the Minister for Home Affairs.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I am Barry Taylor . I am the Deputy Chief of Police in the States of Jersey Police.

Deputy D.J. De Sousa of St. Helier : Deputy Debbie De Sousa.

Deputy C.H. Egré of St. Peter : Deputy Collin Egré.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Senator Sarah Ferguson, Chairman.

Ms. S. McKee (Training Scrutiny Officer): Sammy McKee , Training Scrutiny Officer.

Ms. K. Boydens (Scrutiny Officer): Kellie Boydens , Scrutiny Officer.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Thank you. First of all, thank you for getting the information to us so quickly. I just wish everybody else would be as efficient as your department.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

It was quite difficult trawling through my emails, as I think I explained to you by email exchange. One of the problems is there were a number of emails which were clearly confidential. In some cases I was asked to confirm that I would treat them as confidential, and this was not just commercial confidentiality. I take the view that I should not be lifting the confidentiality on that unilaterally without the agreement of other parties. I can tell you pretty well who the other parties are if you wanted to approach them in relation to those.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Yes, that would be helpful. Thank you.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

One area of confidentiality was the exchange between myself and Senator Philip Ozouf . Another area of confidentiality was a draft report which was marked confidential, which came from Mr. John Richardson. That was right smack in the middle of one set of exchanges in relation to that. There may have been others but they were not particularly important. The other thing is I have not included all my emails because there were some emails which were in relation to press interest and who had said what to whom and I did not think that was particularly relevant. If you think otherwise I can provide those to you as well but I did not really think they were terribly relevant.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

The report that you received that was confidential, when was that sent to you?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

It is going to take me a few moments to find that. Here we are, 23rd December 2010 from John Richardson. That was the confidential report from John Richardson. I did provide you with another report which was not marked confidential which was produced by him. I do not think that was the same one. The exchanges with Senator Ozouf , there are a number.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Just to clarify, Minister, for my own benefit, everything that we received from your department via email is not confidential, so the pack that we have at the moment?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That is correct, yes. I was working on this on Friday afternoon with a colleague. It was quite tricky because when you try to go through the names of the relevant individuals and print out all the things you get partial strings and then you have to match them against each other. In some cases you have got the start of a string and then a confidential kicks in. I think in one case you have got the end of a string after a confidential. So I tried to give you as much as I could without creating problems there. I am trying to find Senator Ozouf 's emails in case you wanted to ask me about them. There is a string round about 9th and 10th November 2010 which was confidential.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Super. I wonder if you would just generally take us through the story, the chronology.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Yes. It might be helpful if Mr. Taylor started because his knowledge goes back before mine in relation to this. I am not sure exactly when I became aware of Lime Grove as a possibility. It was some time in 2010 and obviously we had been doing work previous to that on producing sensible schedules of accommodation needed. Unfortunately, I am afraid that some of the work done in the past had been quite unrealistic and in fact as a result of the work done by Mr. Taylor we were able to reduce, I think by 30 per cent, our space requirements. It may be better if we start with Mr. Taylor because I kick in well down the road in terms of Lime Grove and he can give you more of a flavour.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Assuming that, Mr. Taylor starts and the Minister kicks in as you want to.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Panel. I came to Jersey first of all in March 2009. David Warcup at that time was the acting Chief Officer and within a few days of me arriving he asked me to familiarise myself with the work that had been ongoing for a number of years in relation to the identification of a new police  headquarters  for  the  States  of  Jersey  Police.   It is  evident  that  a programme of work to deliver a new police headquarters building had been in progress for many years and had suffered considerable delays and difficulties. I think the whole project was audited in February 2007 and it recognised then

the specialist nature of police buildings and the difficulties faced in trying to make progress within the constraints of some of the sites that were available and indeed a capped budget. Following my initial overview of the documentation, I engaged with Jersey Property Holdings, or they with me, within a very early stage and it has always been a very positive relationship with Jersey Property Holdings and very helpful. We put together a new user requirement, setting out our specifications for the provision of a headquarters building and police station, primarily the custody suite which is not particularly good at the moment. It was evident from the work that had been undertaken that previous documentation in relation to the project had over-specified the type of build that was required and it was an opportunity for us now to look towards a new approach to conducting business, looking at adopting better and more efficient business practices and making better and efficient use of buildings, green issues, that sort of thing, and having a general open plan type approach to a general office environment while at the same time recognising the separation of some of the more specialist areas that do require security and that sort of thing. As a consequence of that and the work and tremendous support we had from Property Holdings, we were able to reduce our space requirement by round about 30 per cent. The problem we had, we were working in old buildings and we were looking, therefore, to identify a different way of achieving what our new requirement was at significantly less cost. As a result of that work, I think it was round about May 2009, a new design concept brief was provided to Jersey Property Holdings, which they then took forward. That culminated in 28th October 2009 where the States of Jersey Police and Jersey Property Holdings held a space requirements workshop and we spent all day and worked into the evening going through this, reviewing our specification, looking at our space requirements and funding schemes that may be available. It was a very positive meeting, very, very helpful. A number of actions came out of that meeting, not least the fact that Jersey Property Holdings agreed to produce a report based upon our user requirements which would then be submitted to the Minister for Treasury and Resources and the Minister for Home Affairs for consideration. It was during the course of this meeting, or towards the end of it, where Lime Grove House or the availability of Lime Grove House was alluded to as part of a wider office States rationalisation plan that Jersey Property Holdings had been working towards and, if you like, the police component of that would be one of the early phases of that plan in realising the remaining office rationalisation plan. That took us into 2010 and during the course of 2010 the C.S.R. (Comprehensive Spending Review) came about as well and that was helpful towards us in looking again at how we try to identify a building, and again there were significant benefits to Jersey Property

Holdings and to the States in realising significant savings if the office rationalisation plans were to move forward, through the disposal of assets and that sort of thing. I understand that in early 2010 there were some initial discussions with the vendors for Lime Grove House with Jersey Property Holdings, some initial discussions around about its availability and how things might be taken forward. Then I was told on 27th July 2010 by Richard Cheal, who was an officer with Property Holdings, that a paper had been submitted to the Minister for Treasury and Resources for approval of funding, and a business case making out the economic case was submitted and that case

looked at the release and sale of other States properties to fund the overall States rationalisation plan. On 27th August, again Richard Cheal and I had a conversation and I was told that following tentative discussions with the vendors there was an agreement in principle from the vendors for the sale of Lime Grove House, that they would agree to a sale to include the completion of category A and category B fitouts for the building. I was therefore asked to conduct some further work with my colleagues looking at room datasheets and adjacency diagrams to determine the best use of space and the most appropriate positioning of our staff within a building. I was also advised on the proposed outline governance structure and how the project would be managed and taken forward and some of the timescales that may follow from that. I had a verbal update a few days later on 31st August from Mr. David Flowers from Property Holdings who indicated that the States of Jersey Police needed to be absolutely clear on our user requirement and the specification because we would be asked to obviously sign up to that and make that concrete, as it were, to enable Jersey Property Holdings to move things along.

[10:15]

I was quite content with that. I also understood that some initial briefings had taken place with Jersey Property Holdings staff with the Ministers who were involved in the overall process. On 24th September 2010 Richard Cheal contacted me again. One of the sites we were looking at within the overall plan as an alternative option was the Summerland site where we currently occupy part of that at present and Richard alerted me to the fact that a potential planning issue had emerged on that site where we may have to release a number of our existing car parking spaces or reduce the number of our car parking spaces to make provision for the building there. I did some further work around that and we agreed to reduce the spaces by, I think, 10 or 12 spaces on 28th September.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I think I should kick in now - I was trying not to break your flow there - in relation to that. My recollection in relation to the earlier stages is certainly that there was work going on to provide detailed information as to how much space we needed. I think David Warcup was working on it first, then when Barry came in about March 2009 he was working on that. That was initially, if my memory is right, primarily being looked at in the context of a possible build on the Summerland site. It was going on, I was satisfied what was happening was fine and I left it to the officers to deal with that. At some stage, and this is where my memory is not very clear, the possibility of Lime Grove was raised with me. I think it was raised a number of times, I think probably just very tentatively at first. The key issue then was whether the police were happy to be operating on 2 sites, in fact they prefer to be operating on 2 sites, so there were not issues in relation that. The next stage that I can recall is a meeting at Property Services to discuss more detailed matters. There may have been 2 meetings. I can remember one, I think, where an outline of a series of dominoes in terms of moves of different offices to different parts was being raised and we were part of that. You are probably aware that the domino pieces included South Hill, they included relocation of Customs and Immigration so I had another issue there possibly. They included the Summerland site, they included the ambulance station site, they included the existing police station/fire service area as well. So what was being proposed was quite complicated. Then I can remember a further meeting. I think there were 2 meetings, the second one I think that Deputy Pryke was there because of her interest in the ...

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Do you remember when these meetings were?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I cannot precisely but no doubt Mr. Flowers will be able to tell you. There were not any police with me on either occasion. That is why Mr. Taylor has not got a knowledge of those. But these were briefing meetings in relation to myself. I can remember, I think at the second meeting, at some stage in this process that figures were being spoken about, that there had been some form of negotiation with the vendors, that there was a figure that had been come up with. I can remember that there were valuations which had been obtained. I cannot recall if it was 2 or 3 at that stage. I think it was probably 2 but I am not sure, in relation to back then. I can remember the figures had been done, even at that early stage, looking at comparative costs of this house compared with a straight build on Summerland, which of course has its own problems because you then have to relocate the police elsewhere or in different stages rotate them around and there is always additional costs in doing that and so forth. I was very enthusiastic about this because we had a deal which was going to be on the face of it a great deal cheaper than other options. The one question mark in my own mind was the complexity of the multiple pieces at that stage because frankly the more pieces you put in place the more room you have for people to think that it should be done in different ways. The more chess pieces on the board the more options for moves, if I can put it that way. So I did have a question mark about that but the idea was to do the whole package on a financial basis and come out with money in surplus at the end of the day. So that is where we got to. Then a case was being put together to be approved by Mr. Richardson. I have never really understood

the structure there but Mr. Richardson was going to be the accounting officer. I do not know who made that decision. I was not involved in that sort of process. My involvement really seemed to be approving what was being proposed in principle as Minister with the agreement of the police in relation to that. That is when difficulties began to arise in the sense that Mr. Richardson began to raise a number of questions about different aspects of the matter, the complexity of it, was it right that it relied upon the sale of particular sites which in the current economic circumstances might turn into a fire sale, et cetera. I think there was some validity in these sort of questions. There was definitely validity in these sort of questions but my understanding is that they were working on the basis that they had to work within the existing sum that had been allocated and come up with an overall scheme that did this. That is where the sort of emails start kicking in. You see there is a string of 7 emails, which starts on 15th October 2010 from John Le Fondré to John Richardson. I had an interesting situation here in which Mr. Le Fondré was very keen to see the project proceeding. He, as I understood it, had delegated authority

over the project as Assistant Minister and therefore delegated authority in relation to matters with Property Services, and he was very keen to see it going on. It was drifting and obviously you will see from very early days I start to express concern about the risks involved with drifting, because this was a very good package in terms of costing and it was also going to provide the police force with what they needed, it was also going to be financially very worthwhile. I had a curious situation in which Mr. Le Fondré was trying to push, for him to ring me up at home and get me to write an email to him or to John Richardson or to somebody else, which I was very willing to do, in order to push the thing forward, to try to make it clear that there was pressure on this. It could not just drift. So that probably takes us up to the start of the string of emails. I do not know if we should go back to Barry for a bit more detail from his point of view.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I do not have a train of emails but I can give you the chronology.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

You will have to train your Minister to keep a little black book.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I have got my people to do this, you see. I do not go and take minutes of meetings. I am normally accompanied by one of my chief officers or somebody else who will take notes. It was unusual, those 2 meetings I was not but then Property Services will have had the notes.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

There followed 2 or 3 further meetings on 28th September, 30th September and 26th October where I and colleagues did some further work around sizing, volumes, occupancy, storage, that sort of thing, to inform Jersey Property Holdings. On 27th October 2010 David Warcup spoke to me, having spoken to John Richardson earlier that day, and David told me that John Richardson had now been appointed to pull together the project and revisit the figures in the business case. That led to a risk workshop taking place on 16th November at Société Jersiaise, others were involved, not just ourselves and Property Holdings but representatives from other departments too who would have been parties in the overall relocation plan, and very detailed discussion around the risks associated with the project and again figures and having surety really around the figures we were working with. On 26th November, some 10 days later, I was told that John Richardson and Mr. Ozouf had now taken over negotiations with Camerons in relation to Lime Grove House from Jersey Property Holdings. That led to me having 2 meetings, one on 29th November 2010 and a second one on 9th December 2010, when I met with John Richardson and Stephen Izatt from the Waterfront Enterprise Board, W.E.B., who was working with John, and they told me they were looking again at the valuations for Lime Grove, the overall pricing for the project, and were making an assessment of the fitout costs and they asked me to provide a copy with the user requirements and the space requirements which we had prepared with Jersey Property Holdings some months earlier. So, in due course I provided that to them and they took that away. The second meeting was again picking up on some of the details I had provided, revisiting some of the figures and they just took ...

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

The same people were present?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Just the 2, yes. John Richardson and Stephen Izatt met with me on 9th December 2010. I was told they would be reviewing the space requirements for the police headquarters project.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Yes. Did they make a comment about the valuation?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I will have to look in my note. Can you just give me a second while I check this? "Further work to be undertaken to re-evaluate the police station at Summerland and Lime Grove House. Lime Grove will take the staffing scheduled in the requirements but with little growth for future proofing and they felt there was insufficient space allocation made by Property Holdings. John Richardson was concerned about the build costs and the available budget and need to look for further options to include maybe a single police headquarters or a police station facility at Summerland or a new build at a green field site, and the airport was mentioned. John Richardson was going to engage an independent project manager for 2 to 3 months to work with ourselves to review the user requirements again and report on suitability of costings and that would have to be met from within our existing project budget." We were due to meet again but we did not meet again after that. What did happen was that Mick Heald was appointed to act as the project manager to review the documentation that had occurred hitherto.

The Minister for Home Affairs: When was that, Barry?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: That was on 9th December.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Can  I  just  pick  up  on  this  particular  point?   Up  until  this  point  you  had negotiated with Jersey Property Holdings and it would appear from what you have been saying a very detailed exercise had been carried out at that point about your requirements.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: Yes, absolutely.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

What was your view on what you have just said from your notes that it would appear to be another agency telling you that you can go and do this again, or so it would appear?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

We went over things several times. We needed to be sure of our figures but we were confident in our figures. We had worked on this for a long, long time and we had obviously had professional advice from Jersey Property Holdings and architects and quantity surveyors and that sort of thing. I am just the customer; I set out the user requirement. How this translated into something I am not qualified to say that but we did have some excellent advice and I was satisfied with the figures.

[10:30]

We revisited them several times and I was confident the figures we had in relation to our requirements were precise.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Were any detailed reasons given as to why this was going to be reassessed?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: No.

Deputy D.J. De Sousa:

You said earlier when you began talking about the process that you were involved as far back as March 2009 and that you, along with others, had looked at the process and the amount of space that was needed and you had reduced it by 30 per cent. Was it Mr. Izatt that queried the amount of space that you would need? Is that what you have just said?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

He commented upon the element of future proofing that may follow from the project. If we went for Lime Grove House he was concerned that it would not necessarily future proof us for the next 20, 25 years, something like that, but we would fit in the building.

Deputy D.J. De Sousa:

Was it him that mentioned possibly looking at the airport?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: They both did.

The Deputy of St. Peter: What was your view of that?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: That it was too far out.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

That is fine. That does not surprise me.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That was a very polite answer.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

My next involvement is in January 2011.

The Minister for Home Affairs: We are up to 13th January?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: Yes, we are.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I think I should kick in here. I thought it was time for me to come back in. I am going to go into the sequence of emails from my point of view. You will see that the sequence starts with an email from me to the Chief Minister, to Senator Ozouf , Deputy Pryke, Deputy Le Fondré, 8th November 2010, in which I am expressing ... Shall I read it out?

Deputy D.J. De Sousa: Yes.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

"I am very concerned about the continuing delays in progressing this important first step in relation to provision of suitable new buildings for the States of Jersey Police. There is a very significant danger now of the purchase of the property being lost due to the difficulties which Property Services and John Richardson are having in reaching agreement on the details of the proposal. A crucial meeting between them is taking place next Tuesday. If this fails to resolve the situation then the relevant Ministers will urgently need to get involved in making the necessary decisions. The difficulties seem to revolve around the element of risk involved in the package of related transactions. I am very concerned about the greater risks which will be involved in losing the purchase of Lime Grove. All the other options to Lime Grove will take much longer and will be much more expensive. The purpose of this email is to ask you, Terry, to convene an urgent meeting of the 6 politicians involved, together with advisers, for Thursday or Friday of next week in order to seek to give some political direction to a process which is in danger of drifting with disastrous consequences. My best [misspelt] wishes to you all." Then I get a response from the Chief Minister, sympathetic and is going to set up the meeting. Then my reply on 9th November, 2.25 p.m.: "Terry, thank you for that. 11.00 a.m. on [this is just to the Chief Minister] Friday the 19th is fine for me. Where would we meet? I agree that due process should be followed but I have now been waiting for some months for this to occur. I fully understand John Richardson's concerns on certain issues but the risks in the other direction are, in my view, much greater. If risks need to be taken then these should always be calculated risks after appropriate advice is received. Furthermore, if risks have to be taken then I would always

prefer these to be taken by politicians rather than by senior civil servants. However, in this case I believe that by taking a risk in one direction [by which I meant possibly risking paying slightly more than we should] we will avoid a much bigger and more likely risk in the opposite direction, i.e. losing the whole project. Thank you for giving priority to this and generally for your support. Ian."

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Minister, you mention there risk and you mention there about valuations, the possibility of it costing slightly more. Were you aware of the valuations that had been placed on Lime Grove at that particular time?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I think I was aware of valuations. I think 2 rather than 3; it may have been 3.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

How close were they, as you recollect, to the actual?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

When we had 3, if my memory is right, the average of the 3 was fractionally below the £8.75 million price which had been negotiated. I am going off the emails which help me to make sure that I am telling the story correctly. One of the problems I think here which arose more clearly at a later stage because here the difficulties were about the complexity and so on but the valuation issue comes into focus later. One of the problems I think was that there was a view among some people that because it had been empty for so long Property Services should have driven a harder bargain to drive the price down even further. That is an issue of which different people have differing views. Clearly my view from the outset is I do not want to risk losing this because the risks of losing it far exceed any possible gains and you will see a whole string of emails, you have probably seen them already, in which that is fundamentally what I am saying, but that was an issue. There was an issue floating around with Mr. Izatt allegedly having expressed a view that it should not be more than £5 million. I did not treat that very seriously because that is not even the back of a brown envelope calculation; that is nothing. I do not know if that is true or not. You may need to ask him that but I do not know if that is true or not, but that was floating round somewhere in the mix. There seemed to be among some quarters a scepticism as to the valuations, as if this is a special situation because it has been empty for so long.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

When you say some quarters, which quarters are you talking about?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

John  Richardson,  Philip   Ozouf  and  maybe  some of  the people  from  the Treasury.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

There seems to be a divide developing here between the view of the Treasury and that of Jersey Property Holdings. There seems to be quite a divide.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That is absolutely right. One of the complications in this is that there appears to have been an issue, which I could never get to the bottom of, as to whether or not Property Holdings had the authority to take the negotiations as far as they had taken them.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

You mentioned earlier on this morning that you believed that Deputy Le Fondré, as the Assistant Minister with responsibility for Property Holdings, had that delegated.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I assumed so, yes. I assumed by the fact that he had delegated authority they would continue with negotiations. It was his essentially project, if you like.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

From your position as a Minister within Jersey Government would you see that as the norm where the Assistant Minister would have delegated authority in that sort of direction?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That sometimes happens. I am not privy to the internal arrangements within the Treasury. At a later stage, and this is much later, we will come to it, in May of this year we had a situation in which I sat down with the Minister for Treasury, with the Connétable of St. Peter and various different officers and we agreed a negotiating strategy. I was very surprised that a negotiating strategy was being agreed in May 2011. I would have thought that a negotiating strategy and directions for that would have been given quite early on in the life of the project and this has always puzzled me.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

What was that negotiating strategy?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That negotiating strategy ... well, I am jumping right out of order now.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

If you go back to your order and we will come back to that question later.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Can I, because otherwise ... We do need to get there but ... So that was the 8th and 9th November exchanges. There then was a meeting on 19th November at 11.00 a.m. and at that stage it is quite clear that the Minister for Treasury and the Treasury were intervening and taking over the running of the project. That is consistent with what Mr. Taylor has already said, although he knew that in October. I probably knew that before that meeting. It was very clear, Mr. Ozouf was very strong in that meeting: "We are taking over responsibility."

Senator S.C. Ferguson: Did he give any reasons? The Minister for Home Affairs:

Unhappy with the way it had been conducted thus far, I think, is the ...

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Was he able to give evidence of why he was unhappy?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I think the negotiations and the fact that negotiations had got so far was an issue. I think the complexity of the project which had been put together was also an issue.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Did you understand at that stage that there was an exclusivity agreement?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I have absolutely no recollection of that. It is quite possible that Mr. Flowers may have told me that at some early stage. If so, I am afraid that has completely failed to log in my brain at any stage. That was certainly never mentioned in any of the discussions between myself and those who took over the project and the Minister for Treasury. It simply has not logged in my brain at all. If I was told that then I was told that but I was not told that by anybody other than Mr. Flowers and I do not recall being told that. I think if that had logged in my brain it would appear in the emails. I would be saying: "Look, we are risking the exclusivity agreement." That would have been an argument. I normally deploy most of my arguments, if not all of my arguments.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Can I just turn to Mr. Taylor ? In your negotiations was that mentioned to you at all?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I did not realise that until a week ago when the deal fell through. I was told then there was a exclusivity agreement in place. I was aware that some initial discussions had taken place with Property Holdings and the vendors between March and May and there were some additional valuations conducted in June 2010 which concurred with the price being looked at but that is all I knew.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Then if we go on to my next email, which is 29th November 2010 at 10.37, this is from me to Senator Ozouf with a copy to the Chief Minister: "Philip, it is now 10 days since the meeting in Cyril Le Marquand House and I have not heard anything from the Treasury or from John Richardson. On the other hand there is a rumour that there may now be another party who is interested in renting the building. Once a lease of the building is agreed the value of the building would immediately go up to a level which depends upon the rental per square foot." Can I just comment, I am not lacking in expertise in these sort of areas from my own private practice days. I suppose I am a good amateur these days; I am a little out of touch but I am not lacking in understanding of these things.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Apparently good amateurs are better than poor professionals.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I was a professional once in these areas but I am not lacking in understanding of these sort of issues. "It was your decision and that of the Treasury to intervene in the previously concluded negotiation. As you know, there are significant risks in relation to this. On the plus side a successful renegotiation may reduce the price by perhaps £500,000 or £1 million at the very most. On the negative side the vendors may be so annoyed at the attempted renegotiation that they walk away or may be able to lease to someone else, in which case the market price goes up. If we lose the property and if no other similar property at a similar price becomes available then the costs of having to build everything ourselves plus the temporary relocation cost to another site in order to enable the building works to go ahead in phases is estimated by my people as being of the order of £8 million. I am not sure as to what advice you have received on the negative risks involved here but these are not good odds in terms of balance of risk. What is certain is that the longer things drift the greater the risk of the building being lost. I am very concerned about this. If this goes wrong then the consequences are going to be serious. Ian Le Marquand." That is fairly forceful.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

You have put a figure towards your seriousness there of £8 million, this would be £8 million of perceived extra costings over and above the costing for Lime Grove on its completion.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That was the information. I think when I am referring to my people it may well be to Mr. Taylor . It may also be to Property Services. The irony is I think I heard rumours about State Street, although I then had conversations which indicated there were good reasons to believe that they were not interested any longer but I think it was State Street that certainly they were a potentially interested party at an earlier stage, although I was assured that they were not. So that is fairly strong stuff.

[10:45]

I was trying to get over a message of balance of risks. Frankly, my work as a judge, particularly my work as a magistrate in bail areas, is all about balance of risk, so balance of risk is something I am very comfortable with and if you are arithmetically risking £500,000 to £1 million against £8 million you have got to be very confident that the chances of the £8 million loss are very low. Again, my very long experience of working in the private sector in law conveyancing and so on has taught me that surprising things happen. I remember periods when the property market was absolutely dead and people could not get an offer and then 3 months later they would have 3 or 4 offers within a week or 2. The markets would suddenly change. But in this particular case where you are talking about a building of a certain size it only took one party to really focus in on it and we were in serious trouble. So that was 29th November. My next email is 22nd December at 3.42 p.m. to the Chief Minister, Senator Ozouf and John Richardson: "Dear Terry, Philip and John, it is now 33 days since the meeting on the 9th floor of Cyril Le Marquand House at which Philip indicated that the Treasury was taking over responsibility for the negotiations. During that period I have heard nothing other than that John was meeting a representative of the owners in order to reopen negotiations. [That was John Richardson not John Le Fondré because he was not the [indistinct]I have previously outlined the substantial downside risk in terms of increased costs if negotiations collapse. I would remind you that in my view a very high risk is being taken here. Can somebody please update me as to where we are with this. Best wishes to you all for Christmas and the New Year." Then I get a response from the Chief Minister saying: "Sorry you have not been updated. We thought Barry would have updated you on things." But nevertheless there is my second very clear message. I do not mention £8 million there but I am referring back to the other email. Where do we go next? An interesting email, which I have copied you in on, from the Chief Minister to John Richardson, myself, Senator Ozouf , Mr. Taylor and Mick Heald: "Thanks, John. I think the 2 issues although connected need to be considered independently. We need to ascertain that the building can be laid out to meet police operational specifications and then ascertain the likely fitout costs. We need to determine a suitable funding stream in order to achieve a purchase within the capital programme. Without wishing to underplay the importance of this, I have to say the value of South Hill will only be verified at the point of disposal. If the purchase of Lime Grove represents value for money, particularly compared with any other alternative, I believe we need to find a creative solution." So you can see that the issue of the funding was still an issue at that stage but also you can see from my email

the issue of valuation was an issue. That then led on to ...

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Excuse me a moment. I thought that all the layout to meet the police operational specifications had been done twice by this stage.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: Several times, yes.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Yes. I do not know why that is there but obviously the Chief Minister was not as au fait with the detail as perhaps other parties. He was coming in really as a ...

Senator S.C. Ferguson: A referee.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

... fair broker with a dispute brewing between the Treasury and Home Affairs.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Yes. On 23rd December you thanked Mr. Richardson, the acting Chief Executive, for an email. What had he said to you?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

What was that, sorry? I think that is the office estate rationalisation document which I sent to you. That is: "Briefing note re office estate phase 1." That is the document that I did provide to you because it was not marked confidential in any way and I could not see any reason for that.

Senator S.C. Ferguson: Super. Thank you.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That document was provided just before the next meeting and the sequence which took place on 13th January. Mr. Taylor was there and was about to talk about that meeting. That meeting was curious. You will see from the exchange of emails ... this is an email which has got number 7 at the top. These are numbers which were produced by my staff. You can see Mr. Ozouf at the bottom just saying he is going to be available for a meeting. Then you will see an email from the Chief Minister saying: "I think we certainly need either the Police Chief or Barry Taylor to be there. Even though it may be more difficult to handle, I think there would also be merit in David Flowers being present." Then you have got my response to the Chief Minister, copied to Philip Ozouf , Bill Ogley, John Richardson: "Terry, I have met this morning with Mike Bowron and Barry Taylor . They will both need to be there but I will not need anyone from Home Affairs, i.e. I mean Mr. Austin Vautier and the Treasury people. I absolutely agree that David Flowers should be there because he knows exactly what work has already been done. Barry Taylor has a great deal of information but not as much as David Flowers. Thank you for arranging this meeting at short notice. Ian." Then a reply from the Chief Minister: "It has been agreed that David Flowers should not attend although I do acknowledge the detailed information which he has gathered over the period."

The Deputy of St. Peter : So that prompts a question.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Well, yes. If I may just comment on that. It may answer your question. "Terry, I accept your decision although I am concerned that the breakdown of trust between some of the officers in your department and possibly Philip's department on the one hand and Property Services on the other hand is undoubtedly impeding progress with this project." That meeting was curious because David Flowers was not there. We met upstairs, I think on the 9th floor, if my memory is right, of Cyril Le Marquand House.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

It was the Chief Minister's office actually.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

We met in the Chief Minister's office? Okay, thank you. It was then agreed that a different form of funding would be achieved so it got round the complexity. Effectively it was agreed that more funding would be put in from the capital programme, as eventually did happen, so that this became a stand alone project and not dependent upon sales or other things which made it complicated. That did away with the complexity. It just became a project, as it were, on its own with its own funding and so on and the other arrangements around that. But Mr. Flowers was excluded from that meeting. That is the only thing I can say; he was excluded.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Was there any explanation given?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I think it was just feared there would be disagreement and rows over side issues which would cloud the issues. I think it was unfortunate because he might have mentioned the exclusivity agreement.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

You did not get a copy of the McGarrigle(?) Groves Report then that was circulated?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I do not know. I may have done. I heard of its existence from Mr. Taylor recently. Did you see that?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: I have not seen it, no.

The Deputy of St. Peter : Were you aware of it?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Yes, I was aware that the report had been completed.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Do you know for what reason it was completed?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police: No, I do not.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I honestly do not know. I have not referred to it at any stage. That does not mean that I had not seen it. Can I say that I am not sure whether Mr. Flowers was present at the earlier meeting, the 19th November one. I think he was not.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

But you were there, you have got your ... Deputy Chief Officer of Police: No, I was not, not at the ...

The Minister for Home Affairs:

No.  The 19th November meeting was the one when the Minister for Treasury and the Treasury said they were taking over and I do not think Mr. Flowers was present at that meeting either, which is probably one of the reasons why I thought it was important, because issues are potentially going to arise in relation to the nature of the build and so on and technical issues in relation to the capacity of the building and that kind of thing. But there we are, that is what happened. It was a positive meeting because there was fair agreement that funding should be found to simplify the issue. You are looking puzzled when I say that.

Deputy D.J. De Sousa:

Not puzzled, no, just wondering why this is suddenly put on the table when this has been going on for a number of years and yet that funding had not been forthcoming. Now all of a sudden when Treasury take over there is a new funding stream.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

There was a great deal of money put aside and it was just a question of ... if my memory is right, it was an extra £2 million.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I think it was a bridging issue really. Within the overall scheme of things, the first component was the police headquarters space, police station, and then there would be some further moves that would take place and funding for the completion of the scheme would be dependent or partially dependent on the sale or disposal of South Hill. There was a gap of about 2 and a half months, I think, where there was a little bit of a funding gap and I think Treasury were going to bridge that gap to enable the whole thing to flow through.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That is right. There certainly was an issue of bridging gap at some stage but I thought after this meeting that it was just going to be ...

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

The police element was being decoupled, as they termed it, from the overall scheme so they would be dealt with as 2 separate entities and the purpose of this meeting was to ensure there was sufficient funding to allow the police element to take place, which then allowed a second phase to follow on in due course.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Yes. I think the other thing that came out of that meeting, if my memory is right - Mr. Taylor 's notes are better than mine - was that Mr. Heald was going to come in and look at the whole project again. Is that right?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

He was going to act as the project manager, yes.

The Minister for Home Affairs: Going to act as project manager, yes.

Deputy D.J. De Sousa:

What was Mick Heald's role in this when he was introduced?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

He had no earlier engagement at all, no earlier involvement. He came in round about the beginning of this year to act as the project manager to co- ordinate whatever activities were taking place within Property Holdings and ourselves internally as the customer, as it were, being the States of Jersey Police.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

He did, as part of that process, a completely new costing of the various different options which were available. Obviously the main options being looked at were a build on the Summerland site and so on as a primary theme and Lime Grove. There were still a substantial difference between the 2. I cannot say it was as much as £8 million. I have not brought the papers on that, which are probably marked as confidential anyway, but there was still a substantial difference. Eventually he did a costing of a build on a hypothetical States-owned site which would only be worth £1 million. It is hypothetical.

Senator S.C. Ferguson: Very hypothetical.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

If you could find a States-owned site that was only valued at £1 million which was suitable and build the equivalent of Lime Grove on it the costings came out very close to buying Lime Grove, but that exercise was eventually done to demonstrate, in case there were critics, that Lime Grove was a really good option. But Mr. Heald obviously did a lot of other work as well. He essentially was going back over the ground which had been covered initially by Property Holdings.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

If I can revert to Mr. Taylor . Going back on what you were saying earlier, you appeared to be confident in the professionalism of Jersey Property Holdings when carrying out their task. You mentioned surveyors. How confident at this particular stage we are talking about now, the review, that you were receiving that same level of service?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Now? Throughout the whole process we had tremendous support from Jersey Property Holdings, very good advice, excellent advice. We went through things several times, very professional in the way they checked and rechecked things.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Okay, let us move on to the second phase.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Well, Mick Heald did a very good job too. He was not actually introducing new stuff, as it were. He was rechecking what had already taken place and looking at some additional options.

[11:00]

One of the options in the overall scheme was to build a single site option on Summerland, a combined police headquarters and police station on Summerland as an alternative to Lime Grove and maybe some further work on the Rouge Bouillon site.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

A point that you made earlier I believe is that you, as a police unit, were very comfortable with having a double site.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Yes. For business continuity purposes it made good sense really.

Deputy D.J. De Sousa:

Did you see that as a more efficient way of working?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

The opportunities provided by Lime Grove House itself provided us with the opportunity to work more efficiently because where we are at the moment our buildings are quite old and there are lots of modular offices and it was difficult to relocate people within there. It is a costly building to maintain anyway. There are lots of benefits to moving into a more modern office but Lime Grove was largely an open plan environment which enabled us to work differently and there are huge efficiencies to us as a service to work in that way.

The Deputy of St. Peter : Back to you, Minister.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

There is then a sort of gap in the emails and I think that is the period during which Mick Heald is working on this and so I am waiting for the outcome of this, but I am clearly unhappy that we are still taking the risks so I just keep on firing emails reminding people about it. I think I made my position pretty jolly clear. The next email I have got is interesting because it is one I put in ... although it does deal with press matters and a particular reporter in the J.E.P. (Jersey Evening Post) who is present here today. It indicates that what has started to happen is some information has started to leak out and the risk from my point of view in relation to this was information leaking could indicate in some way to the seller what a good deal this was from the point of view of the public. That is what I was really concerned about, but I think it is fair to say others were concerned about that and you will see my email of 18th April at

4.10 p.m. This was in response to an email from Mr. Ozouf who had seen an article: "Philip, I was recently asked about the project and I am currently quoted as saying that I thought some progress would be made shortly." So I must have been expecting the outcome of Mick Heald's thing: "There is some additional detail in relation to the project which is new and did not come from me, for instance they are not now planning to move Home Affairs to the same building. The new bit is about the idea of the sales from Rouge Bouillon and the whole of Summerland being vacated. That is a recent idea. Ben Querée did not mention that part to me at all, even to ask me to comment so he may well have got that after his conversation with me. Having said all that, it is a further indication of the continued risks which are associated with any further delay." There were other emails of this nature when different things were coming up. The press have got a job to do, I do not blame them for that, but you can understand my concern was the vendors suddenly getting wind of this as being a very good deal from a public point of view and then wanting to raise the price and so on. Then the next email I have got is 20th April at 3.26 p.m. In fact, there was a message from John Richardson to me, 20th April at

1.41 p.m.: "Ian, at the last Council of Ministers meeting we pulled the update I was going to give on the police relocation strategy [so clearly there was an item on the agenda for that at the Council of Ministers] as we had to undertake some final evaluation of costs for the Minister for Treasury and Resources. Following a briefing with the Minister on Monday, he has given his approval to proceed with the negotiations, which are now well in hand. I am therefore not planning to include this item on the agenda tomorrow but if you require a briefing on progress I will be available to meet with you." Then my response, which only goes to John Richardson: "John, I am concerned as to where the negotiations are going. Our current figures indicate the downside of losing Lime Grove would be about £8 million and any gains by virtue of negotiations will be very small compared with that. The risks which are being taken in not closing off the deal are in my view too great when compared with the very small possible gain and the difficulties in realising any gain." So you can see it is a pretty consistent message. This is in April; I have been saying that in November and December and I am still saying the same thing. I had no means of forcing this, although you will see in a later email that eventually I get so exasperated that I asked the Chief Minister to put the item on to an agenda of the Council of Ministers so that they can decide as between the Minister for Treasury and myself in relation to this, but we have not quite got there. Then there is the email of 11th May of this year. I think what happened after that was that Mick Heald's information must have become available at some point. I am not sure if it was before then or after then, but I was getting positive signs from those involved that things were going okay and then suddenly something happened which indicated to me that things were not going okay and so you see this email of 10th May at 5.45 to the Chief Minister: "Terry, as you know, I remain very concerned at the apparent volte-face by Philip [that is Senator Ozouf ] in relation to the possible purchase of a building. If there really is a disagreement between Philip and myself on this then this can only be resolved in accordance with the ministerial code by the whole of the Council of Ministers. I would be grateful to you if you could arrange a date for us to come before the Council of Ministers. I would hope that this could be on Thursday, 19th May. Ian." Then a reply: "I share

your concerns. I am perhaps more optimistic about a solution, however it would be wise to pencil in a discussion on 19th May. By that date I would hope the matter could have been concluded but if not John Richardson will be back and can update on the arrangements." I am using my nuclear option, I suppose.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

What was the problem? I mean what was the volte-face?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

I think the problem was the valuation ... sorry was the negotiations. I think the problem was the negotiations.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Were you aware at this time that the old offer had been withdrawn and new negotiations had started?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Yes, I did become aware of that because instead of it going to the Council of Ministers, it went to a meeting on 18th May, which was round about 6.00 p.m. You can see that I am at a point where I am saying: "Let us take this to the Council of Ministers to decide in relation to this because there appears to be a disagreement." At that meeting on 18th May that is the meeting at which for the first time parameters were set in relation to the negotiation. I was told either at that meeting or before that meeting, and I cannot remember exactly when I was told this but I was told a piece of information which had some effect on my view. I had always thought the negotiation had been done on the basis of £8.75 million with the seller doing the dilapidations. The building has been empty for years, there was some repair work to bring it to a reasonable situation. Although that had always been my understanding, either at this meeting or round about this time I was told for the first time from the Treasury side that in fact there never had been a meeting of minds on the price, that what had happened was that Property Holdings had made an offer, subject to all sorts of caveats and ministerial approval and so and so forth, of £8.75 million but with the vendor doing the dilapidations, and the vendor had responded with a capped offer of £8.75 million but without them doing the dilapidations. That is what I was told at a fairly late stage and that was contrary to what I had always understood and obviously that is an issue. The point of the meeting on 18th May was to try to agree an agreed strategy to avoid a situation of a collision before the Council of Ministers at which the Council of Ministers would have to decide and what was then agreed ... to some extent I am a reluctant party to this. I want to go ahead. I would never have taken the risks even from back in November but I am also a pragmatist in terms of finding a way forward. To find a way forward, what I agreed at that meeting was that we would maintain the negotiating position that our bottom

line was going to be £8.75 million with the vendor doing the dilapidations, because that had been the Property Holdings position and I did not think we should go beyond that and certainly was not going to be able to take Treasury with me beyond that. But it was also agreed at that meeting that attempts would be made to see if it could be negotiated down. I would have taken that

back in October the year before but clearly the Treasury view was that the negotiations had not been done properly, they had not been done forcefully enough, and therefore there should now be an attempt to redo them. That decision was only made on 18th May. Subsequently to that, I threw in an email from the Minister for Treasurer to Deputy Power indicating a confirmation of a reduction in the square footage. Subsequently to that there were then further negotiations and the outcome of those negotiations was a deal at £8.25 million but with the dilapidations being done by the vendor. So that was £500,000 better than the deal which I had originally understood had been done by Property Holdings. I can remember congratulating people on that but I would not have taken the risk. I would not have taken the risk but, okay, we seemed to have achieved £500,000, but I would not have taken the risk.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

But in the final event you are concerned about £8 million. That is your risk assessment going back into ...

The Minister for Home Affairs:

In the final event I am afraid it went wrong. Whether £8 million is the right figure or not, in the final event it went wrong. I included in my email to Senator Ozouf my own view on this, and it is to come through to you, obviously. My own view on this is it is just a classic example of public sector inability to make decisions, to take opportunities and get on and do things. We have got disputes breaking out between different departments and different views of different Ministers, we have got different views of different Assistant Ministers, Le Fondré taking one view obviously and the Connétable of St. Peter taking a different view, and all along the thing has drifted from the time when I thought we were going to be ... I thought at one stage we were going to be in a position to go public with something as early as August 2010. Time was ticking.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

What are your views on the fact that in part it went public on the floor of the States Assembly when a statement was made regarding the purchase of Lime Grove?

The Minister for Home Affairs: I am sorry, I did not catch that.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

There was a statement made in the Assembly by the Treasury Minister indicating that Lime Grove was moving forward and how beneficial it was going to be to the States of Jersey Police.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Yes. Although it is his statement it is effectively a joint statement in relation to that. The difficulty we had was the summer recess was coming and we were very well aware of the 15-day period for people to challenge any transaction and so that had to be put out into the public domain, it had to be put out, it had to be lodged so the 15 days started to run, so if there had been a challenge it could have happened before the summer break. So I agree with everything that was in that statement. It was a correct statement; Lime Grove is a wonderful opportunity. I may have missed the sense of your question.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

You were still talking about negotiation and by going public on the floor of the Assembly the indication was that that deal had been done.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

That is correct, that is correct. That announcement was only made after agreement had  been  reached in  principle  for  the  £8.25  million.   So  that announcement was made, I do not know the date of that announcement, but the deal had been done. The revised deal had been done.

Senator S.C. Ferguson: It had been signed?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

No, but you have to go public with these things in order to be able to finalise the thing. There is an interesting issue, though. My own personal preference, which I expressed, was to have got to the stage of having a binding agreement of sale, subject to States approval. That was my preferred option but in fact there was not enough time and in any eventuality there were then further issues which arose after the announcement in the States.

[11:15]

There were further issues which arose in relation to haggling over the nature of the dilapidations because if you are going to do a deal on the basis of a price but with a party doing dilapidations you have got to have a definition of what those dilapidations are, what is the work that they are going to have to do.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

But the point I would make, Minister, at this particular stage, these negotiations had been going on over a long period of time whereas the rate of dilapidation over a 2-year period would not have been that significant, so there would have been an awareness, certainly I would have thought with Property Holdings and by Mr. Taylor , of where that might be. The concern, and I will get your view on it, as to why suddenly at the 11th hour that this has suddenly come up as what would appear to be a major issue to the final setting off of a document to say that there is a binding agreement. Going back to your analogy of risk, it seems to be a very risky strategy.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

What? Getting involved in further negotiations about the terms of dilapidations?

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Yes.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Yes, personally I would have much ... I mean we had an idea what the dilapidations were going to cost. From memory I think it was about £200,000. That is entirely off the top of my head and may be the wrong figure, but I think it was of the order of £200,000.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Just to clarify, do you have that figure available so that we could use it?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I do not have that figure. Mr. Heald might have that.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Well, certainly Mick Heald will have that in due course, and he is a witness, because the information came from him. It is much cleaner and neater to do a deal based on a fixed sum, in other words if the dilapidations are worth £200,000, okay, then we knock £200,000 off the price.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

The point I would make in answer to your comment on this is that again this issue is nothing new. It seems to have been brought up at a very late stage. What would your comment be on that?

The Minister for Home Affairs: Dilapidations were always part of the deal.

The Deputy of St. Peter : That is exactly what I mean.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Even the Property Holdings deal was £8.75 million would then go into dilapidations. Even under that deal there was going to be a need to identify the degree of dilapidations and the cost of them. What you do, if you do the deal that way, is you agree a retention of X pounds and ...

The Deputy of St. Peter :

I am sure we will look at this in later interviews, but from your perspective, from the strategic overview of where we are, we have come to the stage, the very end, after your meeting of the 18th and after the announcement in the States Assembly, when there were still issues regarding the cost to develop later.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

So it transpired, yes. I did not realise that was going to be an issue. I would have thought it would have been clarified on the go what the dilapidations were. There is also some drift in time between this and when they suddenly realised the property has gone but my understanding, and I am not sure if my understanding is from knowledge before or from knowledge after because I was away on holiday in the first 2 weeks of August so I am not sure if I became aware before I went away, that there had been some difficulties agreeing the dilapidations, but I certainly became aware of that when I came back. In fact I also became aware when I came back that there were rumours flying around of another interested party, because my Assistant Minister had picked that up and I think I put in a letter and I did include emails that she was involved in. Then out of the blue we find that it is a done deal, it has been passed, and the property is lost.

The Deputy of St. Peter : What was your reaction to that?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

Well, very disappointed. It is kind of ironic that if you look back at emails you see they are warning about another tenant coming along, et cetera.

Deputy D.J. De Sousa: Yes, from way back.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

So are they going to get the property? The answer is no, it is just that that always was the biggest risk. That always was the biggest risk. Something must have happened so that the State Street suddenly ...

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Since it happened and we are all aware it did, which is why we are sitting here, what has happened since then?

The Minister for Home Affairs:

There has been a meeting with the parties to look at other options.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I attended a meeting last Thursday, a week ago. Sorry to cut across. I went to a meeting last Thursday which was called by Mr. Richardson and Property Holdings and the Planning Department and ourselves to look at a range of other options there to get a plan B together, effectively, and further work is being done to try to identify some further sites in and around St. Helier, preferably States-owned property, States-owned land where further work can be done to try and identify where we can develop a new police station, police headquarters, somewhere around here. There is further work being done now within the next couple of weeks to try to identify a suitable site.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

Who was present at the meeting?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Myself, Mike Bowron, Mr. Richardson, Richard Cheal, Mick Heald, the Treasurer, the Deputy Director of Planning, Jersey Property Holdings, Ray ... Roy, sorry, I cannot ... and 2 representatives from what used to be ... Mr. Izatt and a colleague were there. I think it is called something else now. I can give the details afterwards. I do not have them with me.

Senator S.C. Ferguson:

What sort of sites were you looking at, then? Are you able to tell us?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

Well, there were some sites that had been looked at before, some existing vacant properties and mostly owned by the States, for instance there was the Jersey Girls' School, Summerland, Maritime House, our own site at Rouge Bouillon, the Esplanade site.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

Just to clarify a point for my own mind again, I believe you said all these sites had been looked at before and at the end of the day the Lime Grove mix was the one that was more attractive to you. It would appear we are now going backwards.

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

To a certain extent, yes. We are revisiting other sites for their suitability, yes. There are about 20 sites all told.

The Deputy of St. Peter :

I am being facetious here, with a ground value of £1 million?

Deputy Chief Officer of Police:

I do not know the value of the sites.

The Minister for Home Affairs:

But that is what the figures require, to achieve about the same cost.