Service review is overdue
ISLANDERS must be heartened to learn of news for an imminent ‘fundamental services review’ of States spending. After all, it’s what many have wanted to see for years – and even those who want higher levels of government spending should be reassured by the evidence that expenditure is suitably directed and warranted.
It’s a sensible and well-timed intervention, with taxation and spending high on the election agenda and a confirmation debate on GST expected in the first few months of the new government.
However, there must be concerns about how such a review will meet expectations. P&R has all but ruled out cuts as a result of the review. It wants instead to focus on universal access to services – which will almost certainly lead to more means-testing.
And in terms of sorting out relationships with charities and third parties, that’s a challenge that’s very much overdue.
So expectations of big savings appear to be wide of the mark, and there’s been no fanfare about this project, almost as if to dampen expectations.
But it’s also chilling to recall references to the previous ‘financial transformation programme’, which, it is said, took £28m. of annual spending out of the States Budget.
That benefit seems to have never really been recognised, and just disappeared in a flash.