The 2024 States Accounts have confirmed what P&R was hinting at last week – with a £44million deficit in the island’s day-to-day finances.
The current P&R – most of whom are retiring from the States at the end of this month – gave an overview of the figures before last week’s election, saying it was “important to provide this financial update in advance of the General Election given the significant and understandable focus on public finances”.
The overview has now been extended with the full accounts published at gov.gg confirming the deficit.
Where the Accounts show that Guernsey’s public purse had a revenue deficit of £9m in 2024, that reflects a shortfall of £21m against the budget.
The revenue deficit means less money came in from things like income tax, social security, and other fees, duties, and charges the States levies to pay for public services.
P&R has also confirmed a £13m deficit in Social Security Funds for 2024, and a £22m cost of non-infrastructure project expenditure such as the IT transformation project, elements of the revenue service programme, and the new electronic patient records system.
Together that makes up the £44m deficit reported.
That figure does not include any income/outgoings associated with the island’s commercial entities such as Guernsey Post, Water, Ports, Electricity, Waste, or States Works.
Nor does it include the financial reports of Cabernet and James Co. which run Aurigny and the oil tankers on behalf of the States.
They’ve not been included because their bottom lines don’t affect the island’s day-to-day finances.
When looked at as a whole, the ‘Group’ operating deficit is £18.8m, rather than £44m but the assets owned by the trading entities can’t be realised to pay for day-to-day public service delivery so it’s excluded from the headline figure.
The States has also confirmed that the island’s investments were valued at £130m higher at the end of 2024 than the previous year. These have not been divested so have also not been included in the Core accounts.
If the investments were included in the bottom line, the Group accounts would have recorded a surplus of £20m for 2024.
The 2024 States Accounts have been presented by P&R at the very end of this term of office.
The publication date was agreed well in advance by the current States, knowing that the next States – to be sworn in on 1 July – will have to approve them.
The current President of P&R, Deputy Lyndon Trott OBE, retires from the States at the end of this month.
“Our Committee is pleased that we were able to oversee the transition to fully IPSAS-compliant accounts before the end of this States term,” he said.
“The next Assembly now has the complete picture of finances for the States of Guernsey ‘Core’, which we maintain is the most important from the perspective of understanding the challenges of delivering public services, and the wider Group of entities under States control.”
His Vice-President, Deputy Heidi Soulsby is also retiring from the States at the end of June.
She’s pleased the island’s accounts are now IPSAS-compliant.
“With the publication of these Accounts for 2024 the States of Guernsey will, for the first time, be able to have an audit report stating that they are true and fair, as a result of the significant changes made,” she said.
“As I stated a couple of weeks ago when we gave a financial update in advance of the election, we’re trying to keep our message simple; we are not raising enough through taxes to fund the services our community relies on. It is clear that this will need the collective attention of the incoming Assembly.”
Deputy Jonathan Le Tocq, Policy & Resources Committee Member, is staying in the States for another four years after a strong showing at last week’s election.
He said he and his new colleagues will have to act quickly to address the island’s continuing financial problems.
“The financial position of the States has been much discussed in recent years and in the lead up to the election,” he said.
“It is clear from the 2024 Accounts that significant challenges continue to exist, which is something the next Policy & Resources Committee – and the Assembly as a whole – will need to focus on as a priority next term. We must promptly find a consensus position on how best to address these challenges.”
The 2024 States Accounts are available at www.gov.gg/statesmeetings.