GETTING the Budget down to £1bn “would be challenging”, the Chief Minister has said after government chief executive Andrew McLaughlin’s recent criticism of current public expenditure levels were raised on the floor of the States Assembly.
Deputy Lyndon Farnham’s comments follow a scrutiny hearing last week, in which Mr McLaughlin – a senior banker by trade – said he struggled to understand “why the public service has to spend more than £1bn to run in Jersey”.
The chief executive told the Public Accounts Committee that there were “serious questions to be asked” about the size of the latest Budget, which includes planned spending of £1.28 billion on delivering public services in 2026.
Citing Mr McLaughlin’s comments during yesterday’s States sitting, Deputy Jonathan Renouf asked whether the Chief Minister thought that £1bn a year was “a realistic budget for government in Jersey”.
Deputy Farnham responded: “Certainly I remember being surprised in 2023 when the expenditure surpassed £1bn, but since then we’ve had to contend with high inflation.”
He continued: “Inflation alone, over the last three years, has put in excess of £100 million on the costs.
“So I think getting down to £1bn would be challenging.”
However, Deputy Farnham agreed that the need to continue “curbing the growth” remained and added that both the current and future government have to “double down a little bit further to make sure we are getting the best value from the public service”.
Deputy Renouf asked Deputy Farnham were he thought future savings should come from.
The Chief Minister replied: “We can make savings by continuing to restrict or bear down on recruitment, consultancy, reprioritizing – I think what the chief executive highlighted with the need to focus on what works best for Jersey and how we prioritize things.
“We’ve increased expenditure in health and education, because we’ve seen significant under investment in those two areas.
“In relation to health, health inflation has been operating well above normal inflation and had we not done that [expenditure increase], we simply would not have been able to keep up with the level of service that the public quite rightly require.”
