Action plan on jobs
Monday 28th November 2011, 3:00PM GMT.
Chief Minister Ian Gorst at a press conference on unemployment
EMPLOYERS are to be offered significant incentives to employ young Islanders or the long-term out of work under multi-million-pound plans to fight unemployment.
The announcement follows Friday’s news that unemployment had hit a record high with 1,500 people registered out of work at the end of October.
They also showed that long-term unemployment of more than 52 weeks had doubled in the last 12 months.
Chief Minister Ian Gorst now plans to use around £4 million left over from department budgets last year to fund extensive plans to get Islanders back to work.
He also appears to have been given almost a blank cheque from Treasury Minister Philip Ozouf, who has promised that funding will be available as soon as it is needed to allow departments to concentrate on the tasks ahead.
Thursday 23 February
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Poor Gorst less than two weeks in and the kiss of death of the ‘Open’ cheque book from the Treasury Minister arrives on his desk.
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appears to have been given almost a blank cheque from Treasury Minister Philip Ozouf
Worrying. Reminds me of the man who considered he had money in the bank as long as he had cheques in the cheque book. Does Philip Ozouf know what he is doing? Or is Philip Ozouf in denial at the not so robust state of the Jersey economy. The worst record of anybody.
When are we to see Philip Ozouf attempt to explain how unemployment achieved record levels whilst he gallivanted around the party political conferences’ of the UK coalition government?
Well done Ian Gorst, same you failed to get your man into the Treasury.
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Blank cheques! Just brings back nightmare memories of Haute de la Garenne where Terry Le Seuer did the same thing,and look what happened there!Witch hunts are still going on years later.Another headless chicken approach,from a council of ministers who have no imagination or real life experience of business,that will achieve nothing.Training,no matter how commendable a gesture,is not the answer if there are no jobs to train for.
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Just make sure the jobs go to those local people who have paid their stamp for years and not the first foreign national off the boat! I belive its called the regulation of undertakings… please enforce it.
Think twice, employ a local.
Think twice, grow the economy.
Think twice, invest locally.
Think twice, stop wanton immigration.
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When welfare payments and decisions came from the parish the totals were never like this.
Now it is too easy for the work shy to stay in bed as they get too close to what people are earning with no close supervision.
Get 4 kids and you have nice States house and garden to put your feet up in.
Why not put a cap on benefits as in UK?
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I take it you have never experienced being out of work or being made redundant? typical naievete comment.
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How about funding the job creation scheme with our own version of the UK banking levy and extend it as wekk to the trust companies who facilitated all those SPVs and securitisations that did so much damage? I dont think we should aim like the UK to raise £2.5 billion a year but every little helps. And its a levy and not a tax so no zero ten problems! The partners/directors may have to hold off in buying that new Porsche for a year but we are all in this together I understand.
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Blank cheque! Remember Ian, Graham Power was given one for Lenny Harper to lead the child abuse disaster. No-one was accountable. Beware, be very very aware of a blank States cheque
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It would need to be a very good incentive for me to waste what little money I earn paying a lazy young local who will be constantly late for work, rude to my customers and difficult with their co-workers.
I’m sure there are some decent hard workers out there, unfortunately they are quite a rare find.
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And if your attitude is in any way typical of other Jersey employers (presuming you’re not just making it all up) then decent, hard-working employers must also be a rare find.
You dealt out the sweeping generalisation behind the cover of your anonymity and now you get it thrown back, you inadequate person.
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Unfortunately Mr Gosselin, and I doubt that you are an employer. Jersey Employer is pretty much spot on. Instead of giving away more money it would be far simpler to erase some of the crippling employment laws we have introduced. Sdaly employers are reluctant to take staff of for fear of getting stuck with a bad egg who runs to the tribunal and claims whatever, which in 99% of cases results in a pay out.
I do not believe #8 is an inadequate person, probably just someone who is holding on to his remnants of business in this over regulated economy.
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If this is the level of mismanagement you employ, you are lucky to still be in business. Underemployment did not rise from near zero to over 1,000 because of an outbreak of sloth.
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The workers are not rare to find, it’s more like they are avoiding working for companies like yours. Pay a guy the same rate and conditions as all your other workers, you might just reap the benefit.
The one stumbling block for most who seek work, is having past experience in the vacancy they are applying for. Just because an individual has not got an N.V.Q in certain types of employments, it doesn’t mean they are completely useless. The States should in situations like now, put a block on internal states job advertising, why in this present situation should those who have already a good decent states job be allowed to cherry pick their next move. when there is hundreds out of work.
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I think he is our own Obama, lots of promises and good intention we have yet to see if he will deliver. I hope he does.
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They continue to tiptoe round the immigration problem. They will do anything to avoid grasping the nettle. Such clear political cowardice at such an early stage of a new “government” does not bode well for the next three years.
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@ Quint you forgot to put think thrice about the state of the UK and that it justifies why all your points are more than just and fair!!
Stops the divide getting bigger aswell let’s get these locals off the scrap heap that most immigrants feel they have the right to push there..
We all want better but NOT at the expense of long term negative effects cheap labour keeps imploding on us….
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Saying that most immigrants feel that they have the right to push ‘Locals’ on to the scrap is total nonsense. How could you possibly know that. I doubt that anyone comes to Jersey with the idea of depriving a ‘Local’ of work.
My advice and I know you don’t want it, is for your own sake don’t display any of these attitudes at a job interview as you probably won’t get the job.
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What a joke, kill the economy with incessant tax rises then wonder why no one can get a job? Idiots.
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@ Eric, careful some may start calling you racist for common sense like that…
To the above post re locals being rude, it’s amazing how taking someone less fortunate under your wing can change their attitude, a little bit of respect to those you look down on goes a lot further than you think, you may find yourself in a predicament one day where you could be even less fortunate. I sincerely hope that doesnt happen but careful.
Be careful how you treat those on the way ‘up
You never know who you might meet in the way down….
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Should the caption above Mr Gorst not read:-
“Employment – Our Highest Priority?”
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Geordie – You are a star. Just goes to show what a minefield politics can be.
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I am so pleased to hear the Chief Minister is adressing the unemployment problem.and taking
responsibility for the peoples needs,
As the working life is now longer there is not the vacancies there used to be.However if
people are trained and qualified they can at
least apply for work in Australia or New Zealand where jobs are plentiful.
And have a chance of a good life.
Well done Minister at last someone who cares.
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This is good news.
Under Le Sueur (whom Ozouf had a much greater hold over) the governments plan was austerity and regressive tax rises. It’s very good news to see that the current Chief Minister has realised that the austerity approach just doesn’t work (as made obvious by the recent figures on the UK economy) and that Jersey will only improve if our recovery is led by growth.
This means spending more on worthwhile projects like this one (if there is to be cuts, let them be in waste, not in wages or front line services) and tax cuts for consumers (I sense GST may soon be removed from food).
If this signifies a wider change in government policy, than this is a much bigger issue than the media is letting on.
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What exactly are they going to be doing?
Are we going to have six guys standing over every hole in the road puffing on fags instead of the current four?
As #5 rightly points out, it’ll take a lot more than the incentive of an honest day’s pay for an honest day’s work to get these idle spongers out of their council beds.
Stick the £4m in the “rainy day fund”…the forecast is looking pretty bleak!
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Why don’t Social Security STOP issuing SocSec cards with immediate effect?
This is the only control we currently have to prevent anyone taking a job. I know there are cash in hand workers who flaunt the rules – always will be. But we need to stop the influx first.
Even those on J-Cat and contracts should have an expiry date on the cards and have to reapply (like a passport) and prove through their employers they are still required and that others cannot still do the job.
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All too true. All too simple.
But no, the lawyers in the Jersey Greffe are drafting a new law.
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Why make essential employees re-apply. They are here because they are essential. Do you really think that we are going to be able to persuade doctor’s, nurses, consultants, surgeons, pharmacists etc. to come to the Island and keep us alive on the promise that, if someone local gets qualified, then they will be told to leave the Island.
‘Your usefulness to us has ended so clear off.’
Fortunately, the people in charge know the truth and do not listen to nonsense like this.
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Dave C,
No-one is essentially employed.
The regulation of undertakings clearly stipulates that you should employ a non local person ONLY if the skills are not available from a local person.
Additionally any person brought in should train another person so that they are not required long term.
Unfortunately neither of the above is regulated or even adhered to.
We should be trying to retain the local talent that leaves the island never to be seen again once graduated. The opportunities are just not here for the local person when jobs are advertised in the UK and overseas press only.
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Com-mentator I’m just wondering why you think you could treat people like that? Do you really think skilled and much needed people would agree to come here if they were just going to be kicked out after a couple of years for no other reason than their nationality??
We are people you know. We have our children to consider. And Jersey is not such a paradise that we’d take any kind of treatment to be here…
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Wow Spock looks even scarier than usual in this picture, is he morphing into an alien
I started work on the YTS in the 80′s it got me into the routine of working and I’ve been fully employed ever since. Just make sure it’s not abused by unscrupulous employers. Limiting to people who have been here 5 yrs or more and enforcing the regulation of undertakings law is a must.
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17. “an honest day’s pay for an honest day’s work”
And what’s that then? Busting a gut on subsistance wages?
It is my opinion that cheap wage labour doesn’t do much good except to the businesses exploiting it. The economic divide is getting greater and greater in Jersey which will do no good long term and I believe it will end up causing unrest and more social problems. We don’t want to go down the gated areas route as is common place in countries with a great economic divide.
With a shakey world economy and an open door policy I expect the unemployment level to keep climbing over the next few years. Levels of 5k to 10k would be my estimate. Indeed it could end up collapsing social security if things don’t get sorted out and a strict immigration policy set up like just about every other country in the world.
What Jersey needs is the return of the apprentice scheme common place in previous times where school leavers were taken on and properly trained up to do the job. They then had a job with a wage commensurate with experience in the company.
Unfortunately now some employers seem to want a free lunch and expect others to do the training for them. They then step in and head hunt the trained workers leaving the other compsny to pick up the pieces and begin training someone else to do the job the first person was trained to do. Short term fixes are a waste of time and money they must have substance and a defined objec.
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As I understand it, companies do not need to train school leavers, they just order up some pre-trained people from wherever they fancy and they arrive to work for low wages, topped up with benefits for their kids in tow.
AND OUR GOVERNMENT ALLOWS THIS
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Dave C at 18; what do the doctors (not doctor’s) own?
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Frank,
Really ! Why bother ?
By the way.
The Doctors own the knowledge to cure you of some of your ailments. Unfortunately, they cannot cure pedantry.
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Knowledge isn’t owned, Dave.
Furthermore, the Regulation of Undertakings (Jersey) Law clearly stipulates that you should employ a non local person ONLY if the skills are not available from a local person.
Additionally any person brought in should train another person so that they are not required long term.
Unfortunately neither of the above is regulated or even adhered to. If doctor’s (sic) are so clever, then one has to wonder why they or their advisors don’t understand this.
We should be trying to retain the local talent that leaves the island never to be seen again once graduated. The opportunities are just not here for the local person when jobs are advertised in the UK and overseas press only.
That is the law and it is the position, regardless of what your spurious sentiments might reflect. Perhaps a cure for such nonsense will be devised one day by the doctor’s, who will issue prescription’s which will be redeemed by the patient’s at the chemist’s's shop.
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Wheres the action plan of immigration?
A lot of votes went to people on the basis of immigration.. so quickly forgotten yet so urgently needed.
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There is no action plan on immigration, nor will they be. These people are not affected by the immigration problem, closeted as they are in their remote ivory towers.
So what do they do? They produce ludicrous, opaque schemes as a sop to make us think that they are doing something.
What should they do? Well, everyone can see the answer but they are too spineless to implement it. The answer is to stop the present uncontrolled immigration and to revert to very strict controls.
Work permits should be introduced.
Racial discrimination against local people should be stamped out.
So far as the latter is concerned, the legal framework will shortly be in place when the anti-discrimination law comes into force.
The states will do nothing. The matter will probably get worse and worse until there is either some kind of riot or some Jersey person brings a discrimination case to court.
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Brass monkeys
‘There is no action plan on immigration, nor will they be. These people are not affected by the immigration problem, closeted as they are in their remote ivory towers’
Not affected? you’re having a laugh!
They’re encouraging it because there is money in it.
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