In advance of a new regular Jersey Chamber of Commerce column, starting next month, JEP Business asked the organisation’s chief executive, Murray Norton, to explain a little more about Chamber’s role
Does Chamber need any introduction?
The Jersey Chamber of Commerce is a familiar name to many Islanders, and I guess if you’ve been operating locally for 254 years, you’d certainly hope that was the case.
Like many of my predecessors, I have spent much of the past four years carefully crafting and repeating the answers to that question, and it is interesting to often see the surprise of those learning something about Chamber for the first time.
Okay, so what is Chamber?
The Jersey Chamber of Commerce is the second-oldest Chamber of Commerce in the world and is the largest business organisation in Jersey, currently with close to 600 businesses as members.
These businesses employ 64% of the private-sector workforce, so that is quite a hefty representation of commerce that sits within the Chamber office. Chamber is completely separate to government, both in its funding and its independence of thinking. I mention this only because I’ve often had comments or questions asking if Chamber was connected to government, but it is totally self-funding and represents the views of its membership.
Some of the members voluntarily sit on one of several sector-led committees – Finance; Retail; Building and Construction; Tourism, Venues and Attractions; Employment and Skills; Environment; and Future Chamber – where the clear and present issues faced by that sector are discussed and from where the engagement with government often results. There is the combined expertise of some 80 volunteers on these committees, plus our president, vice-president and treasurer. Their support and the brilliance of our office manager and events and marketing manager makes what Chamber does possible.
What do you do?
In short, Chamber interacts, informs and influences, both with its many business members and, as mentioned, with government, Scrutiny, States Members and many other organisations. Interacting is crucial and keeping dialogue open between the needs of business and the officers of those representing the Island is often described as a ‘critical friend’.
Keeping businesses and government informed is clearly important and never more so than during the past two years, when Chamber’s central role in feeding information back and forth between the two in the midst of the Covid crisis has been acknowledged as invaluable by all. Chamber’s access to regular discussions with government ministers, officers and scrutiny panels, together with key businesses within every sector, continues to bring a reasoned influence on decisions based on better information being available.
Of course, Chamber provides other platforms for opinion and information too, with regular webinars, breakfast briefings and the very popular Chamber lunches. By example of how varied these can be in subject matters, on 9 March our lunch covers diversity and inclusion and why it’s a priority for Jersey employers. The following lunch, on 23 March, will be a special briefing on the Our Hospital project. Tickets are available for both, by the way, at jerseychamber.com.
Why should firms become a member of Chamber?
Running a business is challenging enough and often having someone hear your concerns and have the ability to raise them on your behalf – to represent you – is something Chamber does. Conversely, government, scrutiny panels and the media want to know what businesses think, so via Chamber’s daily meetings, the flow of dialogue flourishes. We keep members informed of the latest and future news, networking opportunities, website placements and discounts to Chamber events too, alongside being part of the collective business strength of Chamber, and joining us is simple. Just email admin@jerseychamber.com for more details.
