​Request
Government of Jersey London Office Costs
A.
Annual rental and service costs for the office
B.
Total amount of staff employed working at the London office
C.
Total annual payroll for London office staff
D.
Length of lease agreed for London office
Response
A.
Article 33 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 Commercial interests
Article 33 (b) allows an authority to refuse a request for information where its disclosure would, or would be likely to, prejudice the commercial interests of a person (including the scheduled public authority holding the information). In this instance, we believe the rental amount is commercially sensitive as it was the outcome of negotiations between parties.
B.
Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 Information accessible to applicant by other means
(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it is reasonably available to the applicant, otherwise than under this Law, whether or not free of charge.
(2) A scheduled public authority that refuses an application for information on this ground must make reasonable efforts to inform the applicant where the applicant may obtain the information.
The link below fulfils our obligation under Article 23(2) by informing you where the information can be obtained.
Government of Jersey London Office
The office is also supported, at no cost, by a temporary secondee from the UK government.
C.
The Jersey London Office is a wholly owned company which is grant funded by the States of Jersey. The amount of the grant is published in the States of Jersey accounts:
States of Jersey accounts
Article 25 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 Personal information.
(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it constitutes personal data of which the applicant is the data subject as defined in the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2005.
(2) Information is absolutely exempt information if
(a) it constitutes personal data of which the applicant is not the data subject as defined in the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2005; and
(b) its supply to a member of the public would contravene any of the data protection principles, as defined in that Law.
Due to the low number of staff working at the London Office, it may be possible to identify employees (former or current), and as this information is personal information it is exempt under Article 25.
The information cannot be disclosed because its disclosure to a member of the public would contravene one or more of the data protection principles, which are set out in Part 1 of Schedule 1 to the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2005. As a public authority, the States of Jersey must observe all of the data protection principles when processing personal data. The exemption from the duty to disclose personal data, where to do so would breach a data protection principle, is an absolute exemption, therefore the public interest test in Part 2 of the FOI Law does not apply.
D.
The lease on the London Office runs from 21 March 2014 to 5 Oct 2018.
