The president of Policy & Resources has admitted that she would accept committee budgets growing ahead of inflation next year, which, she said, would leave government in a stronger position to make efficiencies in the future.
And Guernsey Press inquiries have uncovered that some committees are preparing to ask for even more money and that a significant amendment is being drawn up which, if supported, would give all committees a much more generous budget than currently offered.
Even if that option fails to materialise, several of the presidents of the spending committees have made it clear that they definitely will not be supporting real terms budget cuts, one of the options put forward by P&R.
Health & Social Care is going further and issuing a stark warning that if that proposal is adopted, it would require unpopular service cuts as well as controversial new charges.
Employment & Social Security said that even the more generous of P&R’s two Budget options would leave it short of the cash it will need next year.
ESS president Deputy Tina Bury said she would ‘wait and see’ whether a so-called ‘Option C’ amendment emerged, but her committee is also considering laying a standalone amendment to increase its own budget.
That is an approach also being echoed by Home Affairs president Deputy Marc Leadbeater.
P&R’s options include a 1% saving, and inflation for income and non-pay costs – although the committee itself said this would ‘put very real pressures’ on public services; and a more generous £15.7m. package which has been prepared based on a prioritisation exercise of the Budget submissions from committees.
P&R president Lindsay de Sausmarez said she would be supporting all the Budget proposals, including the more generous option for committee budgets, which, she said ‘locked in’ £5m. of savings already identified by committees and ‘sets out a more structured and sustainable way to secure further ongoing savings totalling £20m. through government efficiency over the next few years’.
She said that the proposals on the whole were still much tighter than any seen over the last decade and that total expenditure would rise by just 1% above inflation as a result, compared to an average 3% year-on-year since 2018.
And Deputy de Sausmarez insisted the Budget was still a ‘prudent’ one.
‘Demand continues to increase, much of it driven by the fact we’re getting older as a community, so it will require fiscal discipline and some tough choices by committees to deliver against that budget – but in my view, Option B should provide sufficient resource to meet that increase in demand without having to resort to the scale of cuts to public services that Option A alone would most likely involve.’
If the States does decide to vote for increased committee budgets it will represent a stark reversal of the decision, taken as recently as January, to cut total revenue spending by 1% in real terms. That policy was set through an amendment from Deputy Rhona Humphreys, which was passed by 29 votes to five, despite many States members admitting at the time that they did not know how it could be achieved.