A threat to job security

In spite of the Island’s claimed capacity for riding out the storm, these could be very desperate times indeed and, alas, desperate times can call for desperate measures.

Against this background, public-sector workers can hardly fail to be alarmed by Economic Development Minister Alan Maclean’s recent comments on States jobs, a review of the head-count and the non-renewal of the five-year no-redundancy deal. It seems to be clear that the job security which has long been regarded as an in-built feature of States

employment is in jeopardy.

That said, no one should be panicking and no one should be unduly surprised by the views expressed. The review and the ‘tough decisions’ promised by Senator Maclean when addressing the Jersey Chamber of Commerce will not inevitably lead to compulsory job losses, not least because a number of other economies can be made before there is any prospect of that last-ditch action. Retirements, voluntary severance, pay restraint and the renegotiation of working hours and other terms of employment can all be fully explored before the possibility of redundancies is considered.

Reassuringly, the Senator has pointed out that cutting jobs is in itself a potentially costly exercise for the exchequer because wages and salaries have, at least to an extent, to be replaced by benefit payments. Economically as well as socially, it is not a neat and tidy way of making savings.

It is, meanwhile, deeply unfortunate but undoubtedly true that circumstances have changed dramatically for the worse since the no-redundancy deal was agreed. With the present level of pressure so evident in the private sector, where jobs are already being cut, there is no obvious case for members of the public-sector workforce – at any level – to be totally protected from the effects of the downturn.

Indeed, anyone who argues that States workers should remain immune from compulsory job losses can be accused not only of putting sectional interests before those of the Island as a whole, but also of living in fantasy world far removed from the realities of the moment.