Civil Servants spend your money not your elected politician

[boatyboy]

Deputy Sarah Ferguson on the five o'clock BBC show today said she was concerned as head of the public accounts committee how department budgets are spent. Its seems that the Departmental chief executive has the power to allocate money were he or she wishes. So for instance if the head of technical services wishes to send fifteen of his managers to look at an incinerator working in America he can. Just put it down to department running costs and ask for more next year, lets visit Australia to have a look at recycling this time? We wonder why Treasurery Minister Terry has his hand out all the time and why parents are paying GST on their kids food and everything else ? Remember the twenty eight represenatives some states members who went to St. Malo to have a chat about a stupid bridge idea. Guess who paid ?

[Jason the Maverick]

We are going back to transparency again.  This is scary BB.....

[boatyboy]

BBC Main internet story Monday 4th August

Watchdog wants advice board rules

A Jersey government watchdog wants the island's chief minister to give more details about a board of bureaucrats that advises the Council of Ministers.

The Corporate Management Board comprises of officials from several States departments.
The Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel wants Chief Minister Frank Walker to give clearer terms of reference and standards of conduct for the board.

The panel said it would give the public more confidence in government.

The scrutiny panel's request comes after concerns that the unelected body, which advises about delivering public services, has too much influence on political decisions.
The scrutiny panel chairman's, Deputy Patrick Ryan, has asked for information as to how the board's officers were held accountable by ministers.
He said a reply would give the public more confidence in the transparency of government.

It looks as though some States members are waking up !!

[danrok]

If your department has an annual budget of say £5m, what are you going to do during the last month of the year if you have £500K left over?

If you don't spend that money fast, then your budget for the following year may be reduced.

No prizes for guessing what happens in practice!

[boatyboy]

Who can correct you Danrok when you have hit the proverbial nail with a sledgehammer. Are you blaming the system of arriving at wrong budget requests. It must be difficult; to get the amount required to run theses big departments penny correct.

A friend of mine has come up with a solution, he assures me it will work. He runs his own small business mind you.

Firstly you need one Chief executive, on the 1st January of the new financial year.
Secondly you draw up the rules…………which may include,

1. All capital projects must come in on time and on budget.

2. All accounts for the department must be made public on the internet only, on a               
     monthly basis.
The idea is that anyone wishing a hard copy can download thus, paying for the paper and time involved them selves.

3. All correspondence be responded to efficiently within four days,

4. Staff costs must be reduced by 20%

5. Office and associated travel costs etc must be reduced by 20%

6. The Chief executive must not be at work for more than three days a week. Golf course meetings are not allowed either.

7. The Chief executive if the above programme of effective management is successful carried out, will be left with a surplice in the departments budget at the end of the financial year of which he / she will receive a bonus of 10% of the amount paid back to States coffers. 

Any other suggestions ?

[Jason the Maverick]

The problem with the Public and Private sectors is that if somebody's work slackens, there is little the Public sector will do about it.  I have heard the term 'Holiday Camp' many times.

You can't just change contracts.  What they could do is start to allow natural wastage and amalgamate departments.  But then again the Unions will come in.....

Sometimes I hope for the left wing that Finance really does make a move.  Because if it does, the Public Sector together with its workforce will go penniless over night.

[danrok]

I think it is just a simple case of States Dept.s needing to be run in the same way as private businesses.  What we have been hearing about the States accounting practices is totally shocking.

The current system cannot possibly last much longer, they will self-destruct and go bankrupt if nothing is done before then.

[admin]

In fact I believe, despite no move to 0/10 as yet, our finance industry has recorded year on year profits!

Ignoring the 0/10 for a moment, current google news on finance is that all are taking a beating so far only with the exception of Standard Chartered. All other finance houses, especially the banks are loosing high percentages of their profit this year, so I expect that this year will be different to "year on rear profits".

I believe it is important to stress this prior to using anything like 0/10 as barometer for any change.

[Jason the Maverick]

Sorry for this question going off at a tangent;

JTM: "Sometimes I hope for the left wing that Finance really does make a move.  Because if it does, the Public Sector together with its workforce will go penniless over night."

Can you quantify this statement? OXERA said something similar to you in that if the Island did not move to 0/10 the highly mobile users of our financial services would move away in their droves. I believe OXERA then gave an example, in one of their reports, as to the consequences of 90% of the market moving to other jurisdictions that did offer 0/10.
The reason I have some doubt as to both your, and OXERA's forboding is that the Isle of Man moved to 0/10 back in 2004. Jersey will introduce the same measure in January 2009. That's 5 years! Where is this mass exodus? In fact I believe, despite no move to 0/10 as yet, our finance industry has recorded year on year profits!

How old is this report?  Sounds to me like now.  Stay where you are.

[Deputy Dawg]

Please provide links to google news items. I can't find any profit warnings for Jersey companies. (Mind you google is the last place I'd look)

Maybe you should start looking at google first then (after all that's where the JEP seems to get most of its world news the page before the letters). Here a list I quickly pulled up from the google business section each with a bank linked to Jersey. Do you still miss the profit warnings or do you need it in ten foot high letters?


http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article4460964.ece
Royal Bank of Scotland braced for £1.7b loss

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_and_finance/article4456163.ece
HSBC profit falls 28% as bad debt rises $10bn

http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewiStockNews+articleid_2470716&title=RBS_to_Unveil_the.html
RBS to Unveil the Biggest Loss in UK Banking History

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/lloyds-tsb-shocks-city-with-70-fall-in-profits-881562.html
Lloyds TSB shocks City with 70% fall in profits

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121748562817100225.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
HBOS PLC said Thursday first-half net profit fell 57%

[Deputy Dawg]

I read the links and can find nothing of reference to Jersey finance companies, or 0/10.

I acknowledge a global impact from the sub-prime greed, but nothing that remotely answers my question.

No mention of 0/10 has been made as the original post that you had a query on clearly stated "Ignoring the 0/10 for a moment" and I think that you will find all the links I have given to you from Google are linked to Jersey Financial Companies.

Just take a walk through town, you will see Numerous RBS buildings, HSBC, HBOS, Lloyds TSB in Jersey. Each of these is registered IN Jersey at the JFSC and its parent group is elsewhere.

And before you start to tire me with that "please provide links to the JFSC" rubbish that you are posting on other threads as well as this one, try getting off your ar*e and doing some investigating yourself. Your question has been answered in full, the fact that it does not fit to the answer you want to portray does not make it wrong, it just makes you single minded in your view to find a fault in a perceived issue.

The fact that you have changed the thread from the waste that the civil servants make to trying to blame this on finance gives me a good idea of your political agenda, in whichever language you wish to use!

[boatyboy]

mumbai

Deputy dawg is a very clever, a switched on dawg. The only thing I can say is that I am seeing the person that gave me this insight next Thursday and have printed your responce so he can have a look. Just to add something I know, the hospital has a budget of £105 million. If you were the boss and offered the deal, he suggests ? would you be inspired to pick up 10% of savings could easy 1/2  million as a bonus and still do a really good job. Get back to you later in the week after he has looked at your letter.

[boatyboy]

cpcarrott  you said,

Average Salary of a Police Constable in Jersey is a little over £40K. In order to have 1 police officer on duty 24 hours a day 7 days a week you require 6 police officers (to take into account shifts, off days, holidays, sickness etc). So it costs about a quarter of a million pounds a year purely in salary (so not including all the training costs, equipment costs and any other related costs) to assign one police officer to patrol an area.

http://planetjersey.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=1767.msg25987#msg25987

Lets have a look at the rates of pay for the same job in tougher more violent cities and regions.

Police have agreed a new three-year pay deal with the government.

UK officers will receive a 2.65% increase from September, with another 2.6% in 2009 and 2.55% in 2010. This is an average of 2.6% each year.
The Police Federation in England and Wales said it was the "best multi-year settlement... in the public sector".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7672188.stm

Police pay scales in the uk.

Constable on commencing Service              £24,675

Sergeants' Pay                                       £34,707
Entry point for officers promoted from constables' pay point 9 or less.

Inspectors pay                                       £44,469 (£46,419)

Chief Officer's Pay 2009                                         
MPS (4XACs)                                          £176,943
West Midlands
Greater Manchester

http://www.police-information.co.uk/policepay.htm#constables

States employees get between 28% to 50%  more than the UK. Sarah Ferguson has expressed an opinion that the retirement age of 50 for the three services is no longer tenable, especially as we all may have to work until we are seventy. This will be looked at in the future.

If you’re a manager at the ambulance station fire service or police you can also retire early see the link. It's not just the front line staff.

http://planetjersey.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=342.msg11606#msg11606

Maybe if the Jersey  police where paid more in line with their English counterparts we could afford more of them, and this would represent better value for the public purse ?

Boatyboy
 

[Fritz]

Wouldn.t it be more effective, (cost-wise), just to have a Curfew? Apart from weekends, there should be very little need for a Police Force in Jersey.

[Sarah Ferguson]

A police constable in the Met - just qualified (approx 2 years training) plus London Weighting of about 6k, earns just over £31k a year.  Equivalent in Jersey earns something over £37k a year.

All these figures are available on the various websites and were correct at the last time of checking. 

We have brought the minimum retirement age up to 55 from 50 - which is a start.