Benefits and work licences for under five-year residents (FOI)

​Request 

A

Are any kind of benefits or handouts given or paid out to any new under five-year residents?

B

How many under five-year job licences are there?

C

How many under five-year licences are currently filled from the total amount of licences issued to employers?

D

How many under five-year licences have been issued to the States departments and States owned companies like JT, Andium, Jersey Ports etc.

Response

A

The Social Security Fund provides benefits to people who satisfy specific conditions and have paid Social Security contributions for a required period of time. Mainly to help people when they are less likely to be able to support themselves through employment, including maternity, sickness and old age. 

These benefits are not linked to a five-year residency period. Contribution conditions vary depending on the type of benefit claimed. In order to qualify for a contributory benefit, the minimum contribution requirement is three months contributions paid above the lower earnings threshold, plus contributions paid in the relevant quarter which is dependent on the date of the claim.

There are a number of tax-funded benefits, not based on contributions paid, which have a residency condition accompanied by other qualifying criteria. 

Income Support is the largest of the tax-funded benefits available and is payable to eligible households where at least one adult has satisfied a minimum of five years’ continuous residence on Island. 

There is provision within income support legislation ‘in exceptional circumstances’ for the Social Security minister to provide financial assistance to a household that does not meet the qualifying criteria.

Details of contributory and tax-funded benefits, and other services administered by the Social Security Department, are published on gov.je and included in the Minister’s Report and Financial Statement.

The 2015 report is due for publication shortly and will become available online.

B

There are 8,129 registered permissions, including permanent permissions, seasonal permissions, and contract permissions. 

C

We are applying Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 as information is accessible by other means. See Labour Market reports below.

D

There are 180 permanent registered permissions for the States of Jersey in total.

There is one permanent registered permission and 20 seasonal registered permissions for Ports of Jersey Limited.

There are no registered permissions for Andium Homes Limited.

Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 exemptions Articles 33 and 34 applied for JT Global.

FOI exemption(s) applied:

Article 33 – Commercial Interests

Article 34 – The Economy

Justification for exemption

Article 33 – Commercial Interests

Disclosing staffing permissions of 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. This also applies to States owned businesses such as JT Global in competition with other private businesses.

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 or profitability and have a potentially negative effect on the economy as a whole if individual business licencing staffing permissions is publicly available, this also applies to States owned businesses such as JT Global in competition with other private businesses.

Article 34 – The Economy

The cumulative effect of individual commercial interests may have a negative effect on the Jersey economy and financial interest of the States of Jersey should businesses be discouraged from operating, investing and expanding in Jersey by the disclosure of staffing permissions

In particular, the States Strategic Plan very clearly emphasises the importance of economic growth as our society ages and costs such as health care costs rise, with a key element of that plan focused on business and job creation in a wide range of sectors.