THE government is ‘going after the little guy’ by seeking to reclaim support money that it says was overpaid to self-employed Islanders during the pandemic, according to the head of Scrutiny.
Senator Kristina Moore, chairwoman of the Scrutiny Liaison Committee, has requested the government extends its repayment deadline of 28 February for ‘excess’ money paid out under the Co-Funded Payroll Scheme, claiming sole traders had been asked to make repayments they could not afford.
The Senator said that she made the request because the Public Accounts Committee were still reviewing the matter and an internal error between government departments had resulted in ‘conflicting’ information being sent to applicants.
She added that she had spoken to many people who were suffering ‘considerable stress’ by the move, with one claimant having been asked to repay £15,000, only to have the amount reduced to £900.
Senator Moore said: ‘I’m aware of a number of groups of people who are really struggling with this and I have colleagues who have constituents who are being chased.
‘It seems to be the sole traders who are being really affected and I don’t know why the government decided to really go after the little guys on this. I had one case where someone was asked to repay and were told they had do so within in a year.
‘That meant they would have to pay £600 per month – that may not seem like a lot of money to the government, but for these guys, with the cost of living in Jersey, it’s huge.’
She added that even an accountant she had spoken to had found the financial-information requests made by the government during the claims process difficult to follow.
‘There seems to have been one department that has been asking claimants for details of their net income, while another has been asking for their gross turnover,’ the Senator said.
‘I spoke to an accountant who has been dealing with the requests and he said he was confused by it.’
Last month the JEP revealed that around 270 self-employed people had received letters demanding repayment of up to £1.9 million that was paid out under the co-funded payroll scheme, through which the government subsidised staff wages for businesses hard hit by the Covid-19 outbreak.
