The long-running pay dispute continues to gather momentum, with hundreds of public sector staff joining a demonstration in the Royal Square on Saturday morning and teaching unions the NASUWT and NEU yesterday announcing strike dates.
Now, Deputy Geoff Southern has lodged a new proposition calling for the States Employment Board to return to the negotiating table with union representatives.
The SEB and civil service unions are currently in mediation talks. However, the SEB have consistently said that there is no money available to fund new pay deals.
States staff have become frustrated at years of below-inflation pay awards, which they say has eroded their standard of living.
Deputy Southern, the vice-chairman of Reform Jersey, is hoping Members will agree to exploit a clause within the Medium Term Financial Plan provisions which allow the Council of Ministers to release funding if there is a ‘serious threat to the economic, environmental or social wellbeing of Jersey’.
A similar proposal debated in December lost by just one vote.
Deputy Southern said: ‘The information I have received suggests that there is no extra money on the table.
‘These are moderate people – they don’t take strike action lightly. We have already lost goodwill.
‘Saying we cannot afford to do this is a spurious argument. We cannot afford not to do something to make sure our work force is reasonably content.’
No amount has been specified in the proposition, with Deputy Southern arguing that the SEB needed to have the resources to ‘return to the table, negotiate hard and find an outcome that both sides can be satisfied with’.
In December’s vote to release money from the MTFP, Senator Tracey Vallois – the then-chairwoman of the SEB – abstained. She has since resigned from that post and admitted that had she not been a member of the SEB she would have supported the proposition.
The debate was also controversial for the criticism levelled at States chief executive Charlie Parker, who was allegedly using the Members’ Room to summon ministers, feed them lines and rewrite some of their speeches.
Deputy Southern added: ‘Three people avoided the vote, one declared an interest and we had one abstention. That could be significant.
‘Certainly the shenanigans over the intense pressure of the chief executive was, I would say, intimidating. There was a whole crowd in the back room which made it impossible to get through.’
Senior civil servants have since been banned from the ‘precincts of the States’ during sittings after a ruling from the Bailiff, Sir William Bailhache.
Deputy Southern’s proposition is due to be debated on Tuesday 26 March.
