VISITING hospitality staff can now be housed in a former St Saviour hotel, which is currently being used as accommodation for agricultural workers.
Permission has been granted to alter a planning permit for the Hotel L’Emeraude, to allow it to house hospitality workers for the next three years, after which it would have to be renewed.
The original permit, which was introduced in 2007, was to allow accommodation for Jersey Royal workers. However, last year the firm had no further need to accommodate its staff in the hotel since it purchased Woodside Farms, which is also being used to house workers.
Finding suitable accommodation for visiting hospitality staff has been a problem for a number of businesses.
Earlier this year, the Jersey Hospitality Association said there were at least 600 vacancies in the sector, while businesses that had sourced foreign labour were searching for more than 400 beds for those due to arrive at the start of the season.
In April, a proposition lodged by former St Peter Deputy Rowland Huelin to make appropriate sites available for temporary staff accommodation to house visiting workers was defeated in the States. This was despite an open letter from industry representatives asking States Members to support the proposals.
In a submission to the government’s planning website by BDK Architects on behalf of the applicant, they said: ‘There is a significant and critical identified functional need to provide seasonal and year-round staff accommodation for persons employed by local hospitality operators.’
The L’Emeraude has 63 double bedrooms, two communal lounges, a dining room and kitchen facilities.
In the Planning officers’ approval document, they wrote: ‘The proposed development would provide valuable residential accommodation for full-time rural workers which is in short supply. Therefore, the reuse of this former hotel with a large number of rooms would be sustainable, resourceful and have added benefits to the economy by enabling more workers to be employed in the hospitality industry while also still allowing agricultural workers to occupy the premises if the need arises.’
