Hospitality licenced and Registered permissions (FOI)

​Request  

I would like an up to date list of which hospitality businesses (trading name / premises ideally) hold employment licences and how many licences they have whether in use or not.

Response

Data as at 2 October 2020:

The information above has been provided on an aggregate basis for the hospitality sector as at 2 October 2020.

Having received a number of Freedom of Information requests regarding business licensing staffing permissions, it has become clear that release of specific business information has an impact on the businesses involved and / or the economy as a whole, therefore only aggregate data is supplied.

Due to the low numbers of staff employed by some businesses under the above licenses no further breakdown will be provided as it could lead to the identification of individuals; this information is therefore exempt under Article 25 (Personal Information) of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011.

Articles applied

Article 25 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 2018.

(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 2018; and

(b) its supply to a member of the public would contravene any of the data protection principles, as defined in that Law.

(3) In determining for the purposes of this Article whether the lawfulness principle in Article 8(1)(a) of the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2018 would be contravened by the disclosure of information, paragraph 5(1) of Schedule 2 to that Law (legitimate interests) is to be read as if sub-paragraph (b) (which disapplies the provision where the controller is a public authority) were omitted.

Article 33 Commercial Interests

Information is qualified exempt information if –

(a) it constitutes a trade secret; or

(b) its disclosure would, or would be likely to, prejudice the commercial interests of a person (including the scheduled public authority holding the information).

Public Interest Test

• disclosing staffing permissions granted to individual businesses may provide a competitive advantage or disadvantage to a business. For example, a business expanding or contracting may find it easier or more difficult to recruit staff compared to competitors or it may generally benefit or undermine its trading position

• existing businesses may not wish to recruit Registered staff should such information be publicly available, as it may feel its reputation is damaged. This would impact on that businesses’ growth prospects/profitability etc and have a potentially negative effect on the economy as a whole if individual business licencing staffing permissions is publicly available, for example, hotels, restaurants etc

• businesses may be discouraged from locating to Jersey if it’s Registered staffing permissions may be publicly available as it may feel its reputation could be damaged if publicly criticised

Article 34 The Economy

Information is qualified exempt information if its disclosure would, or would be likely to, prejudice –

(a) the economic interests of Jersey; or

(b) the financial interests of the States of Jersey.

Public Interest Test

• the cumulative effect of the individual commercial interests may have a negative effect on the Jersey Economy and financial interest of the Government of Jersey should businesses be discouraged from locating, investing and expanding in Jersey

• in order to support business and hence the economy during the pandemic period, any action which could compromise trading must be avoided. Disclosure of the information requested could compromise some businesses.

• in particular, the Government Plan very clearly emphasises the importance of creating a sustainable and vibrant economy and enhancing our international profile. It also identifies key challenges around Brexit and the ageing population resulting in the fall in the proportion of people who work. Disclosure of the information requested could compromise some businesses and hence the economy.

Internal Review Request

Further to my recent response to information regarding licences issued to hospitality businesses, I feel the information provided to be unhelpful and lacking any clarity.

The reason for the request is that, as an owner of a six year old local business, I would like a better understanding of where my business stands compared with others. I do not believe clarity in who hold which licences to be an unrealistic expectation but I do feel the protection against sharing the information is there to protect an unfair spread of the licences within the sector.

To further expand on the above, I believe other local businesses do hold an unfair advantage over my own. I would like to better understand how many licences competitor businesses such as Mange Tout, the Potteries Group (within their individual businesses), The Yard (having only just opened and recruiting more unlicensed staff than we ever have in 6 years) along with others in order to better understand or set my own expectation when it comes to my ability (or lack) to employ the skilled staff I require to grow my business.

The information is only delicate if it exposes an unfair distribution of licences, there is no risk in the information being public if the licences are issued fairly and equally. The only reason I can see for this information not being shared is if there are disparities in where they are issued; this would perhaps help me (and others) understand how The Potteries Group are able to advertise for staff in Portugal / Madeira for roles that local people (especially back to work candidates) should be utilised to fill as they are unskilled roles.

I look forward to your response. The information is useful to me and my business and it would be for other businesses too; not sharing it because the licences aren’t correctly or evenly distributed is not ethically correct and only bolsters why I would be requesting it in the first place.

Internal Review Response

An Internal review has been conducted by a senior member of staff independent of the original decision-making process.

The original response has been reviewed and assessed and the reviewer has determined that, the use of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 articles applied to the original response were to be superseded by Articles 38 of the Control of Housing and Work (Jersey) Law 2012 and Article 51 data protection (Jersey) law 2018 as these were more compelling in this instance.

Article 38 - Register

The Minister shall keep a register of undertakings in respect of which any licence under this Part has been granted and any person may inspect the register during normal business hours free of charge or take a copy of any part of the register subject to payment of any prescribed fee.

Therefore, it was found that Article 51 of the data protection (Jersey) law 2018 applied, which states:

Article 51 - Information available to public by or under enactment

Personal data are exempt from the transparency and subject rights provisions if the data consist of information that the controller is obliged by or under any enactment to make available to the public, whether by making it available for inspection or publishing it in another manner, and whether gratuitously or on payment of a fee.

In view of these articles the reviewer has asked that the following data should be released:

Please see the attachment to this email which contains data of registered and licensed permissions held by undertakings that have a hospitality industry code. This list is up to date as at 27 November 2020.

licensed permissions with a hospitality industry code (amended June 2021)