Deputies are likely to agree setting up the fund at the end of the 2027 Budget debate tomorrow and back it with £15m. from the anticipated windfall of Pillar Two company tax receipts.
‘We have already effectively had one application from the Economic Development Committee which preceded the Budget,’ said Policy & Resources treasury lead Charles Parkinson.
‘They are supporting a project to fund filmmaking in Guernsey, which is probably a very good idea. That proposal needs to be evaluated and may receive support from a fund like this one.’
But the funding application will not be evaluated by P&R itself, after the States backed an amendment from Haley Camp to take the approval of projects away from the senior committee and hand it to Economic Development instead.
Economic Development will also be required to report to the States annually on how it has used the fund and the impact of schemes it has backed.
Only one of the five members of Economic Development, and no member of P&R, voted for the amendment, but the Assembly backed it by 19 votes to 15.
‘A very high proportion of applications for funding are likely to come from Economic Development,’ said Deputy Parkinson.
‘Our position is that the one committee which should not be the arbiter making decisions on which applications are successful is the committee which is likely to be making most of the applications.
'This would be a fundamental flaw in the governance suggested in the amendment.’
But Deputy Camp believed that involving P&R in the approvals process ‘risked muddying responsibility and accountability across two separate committees’ and instead wanted the senior committee’s role to end once it had worked with Economic Development to draw up a shortlist of projects for possible funding.
‘Economic Development’s stated purpose is to secure prosperity by generating wealth and employment through the promotion and development of business, commerce and industry across all sectors,’ said Deputy Camp.
‘If Economic Development isn’t going to be allowed to do what it says on the tin, what is it there for? If you are going to be held accountable in the Press when things go wrong then you should have made the decision which landed you there, as opposed to another committee sitting there and not getting the flak for it.’
Her amendment also succeeded in establishing agreed definitions and criteria for the types of project which the fund could be used to support.
The set up of the fund will face a final vote at the end of general debate on the 2027 Budget.
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