Decision looms over extra day off for Liberation

Tuesday 10 March 2015

Islanders will learn this week if we’re going to get an extra day off for Liberation Day.

The 70th anniversary of our Liberation from the Nazis in 1945 falls on a Saturday this year, so as things stand, there won’t be an extra day off for Islanders.

But Deputy Sam Mezec is taking a proposition to the States that would make Friday 8^th May a Public Holiday. He says the event should be marked with a day off work, and that the 8^th of May is a day that should be celebrated as the 70^th of anniversary of VE Day and the anniversary of Winston Churchill’s announcement on the BBC that “our dear Channel Islands” were about to be freed.

The issue has also galvanised public sector workers in Jersey – their colleagues across the water in Guernsey are all getting a day off in lieu, and Unite official Nick Corbel says that his members are expecting the same thing here.

That’s despite the States saying that there is nothing in the public sector contracts guaranteeing an extra day off, and that States workers will be treated the same way as everyone else.

It’s estimated that the cost of the public holiday for States workers would be £1.4 million.

Last month, Unite official Nick Corbel says that the union is “focussed” on the issue.

“I would expect our workers to be given a day off,” he said.

“Historically, that is the way it has always been, although the employer has not approached us as yet. This issue is high on our agenda and we would expect the same provision.”