The ‘Medium Term Financial Plan Addition’ sets out a program of investment in services such as health and education, funded by savings, new charges, and changes to benefits, which together will generate an extra £113m a year by 2019. States Members will debate it in September, but before then a sizeable budget has been set aside to tell us what its all about.

That £40,000 communications budget, running from when the plan was published in June, to when it will be discussed by politicians in September, is a little over £4,000 more than the average annual wage in Jersey, which is £35,360 for a full-time employee, according to the June 2015 figures. 

The communications costs are revealed in a government response to a question from Deputy Sam Mezec.

In it, Minister for Treasury and Resources, Senator Alan Maclean, says: “The Medium Term Financial Plan is a large and complex document, and it is essential that it is explained to Islanders in an accessible way.”

“Many Islanders will not have the time to read the document in full so the Council of Ministers has been looking for additional ways to explain it in summary form.”

To do this the department has built a new website – at a cost of almost £10,000. In defending that decision the Minister says, “…the architecture for the site will also be used for subsequent government projects, so this is an investment for the future. As government moves towards more digital ways of communicating, this document site has environmental benefits and is in line with our commitment to e-government.”

In addition to that website, three months’ spending of almost £10,000 a month has been earmarked to continue communicating in other ways with Islanders. This will involve updating the website with information in response to Islanders’ questions, the writing of blogs and news releases, responding to queries on social media and arranging face-to-face public meetings.

The Ministers’ comments don’t say why that work isn’t being done by the States own in-house Communications Unit. 

To put that spending into context, the Treasury Minister adds:

“The cost of designing, printing and binding previous financial plans each year (Budget and MTFP Annex Update) has been approximately £15,000 per annum. The first MTFP (2013-2015) cost approximately £55,000, including elements of rebranding which are still in use.”