The scheme was launched in April in order to protect jobs in businesses suffering from the financial impact of lockdown and wider disruption caused by the pandemic, and ensure Jersey is “in a strong position to recover when the crisis is over”.

In its first phase, the Government agreed to refund employers a maximum of £1,600 per employee (80% of a worker’s salary up to £2,000) per month, if they could prove “material detriment” – meaning they had seen a drop in turnover of at least 30% in 2020 or the same month in 2019.

Between March and August 2020, the Government helped a total of 67,137 islanders, costing £80,981,348.32. Its peak month was April, with 16,500 employees receiving payments of £21.5m.

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Pictured: More than 67,000 jobs were supported by the payroll scheme in the first six months of the pandemic.

Any firm that signed up to benefit from the support was warned that the Government intended to “periodically publish appropriate information” about scheme claimants, including the name of the business, number of employees claimed for, and total amount claimed.

That data has now been compiled in a report and recently published on the Government website.

The report also includes the names of businesses, total claimed and number of employees supported for all employers who have received payments for at least two employees each month.

The idea of making the list of support claimants public had been floated by Guernsey’s Government in relation to their own payroll scheme, but was dropped amid pointed criticism from small businesses who said that having their finances put in the public domain would put them off claiming support.

The report shows that Jersey’s hospitality sector received the greatest amount of support overall – £21m, more than a quarter of the total awarded to businesses over the period.

Of the top 50 claimants, nearly half were hospitality businesses – 16 hotel/accommodation providers, and five dining groups.

Among them are some of Jersey’s most well-known brands, with Randalls and Liberation Group taking the largest payments under the scheme of around £1.04m and £952,000 respectively. The payments together supported nearly 600 individuals during the period.

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Pictured: The two largest claimants were Jersey’s two biggest pub chains, Randalls and Liberation Group.

The Royal Yacht received the highest payment of any hotel: £694,000, which supported between 61 and 195 workers across all six months.

A potential consequence of hotels’ struggles, commercial laundry services provider AngoraBesco received nearly £396,000 to support up to 59 staff.

Construction firms received the next largest chunk of support, £18m in total.

Dandara, the sector’s largest claimant, was given £486,283 to sustain up to 236 staff over three months, while materials provider Normans was awarded £452,000 to see up to 157 employees through April and May.

Wholesalers and retailers had their employees’ wages topped up to the tune of £12.6m between March and August.

Two of the sector’s largest claimants were department stores De Gruchy (£588,000) and Voisins (£463,000) to help a combined total of nearly 300 employees. Car dealerships Jacksons and Spellbound Holdings Limited (operator of TrustFord) claimed £620,017 and £270,670 to support 142 jobs and 61 jobs respectively.

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Pictured: Department stores De Gruchy and Voisins claimed the most of any high street retailers, supporting nearly 300 employees between them.

Lockdown’s impact on the retail sector may also account for the difficulties of Style Shopfitting, to which the Government paid £344,000 to assist up to 51 staff over five months.

The Airport’s ground handling firm Swissport received the third largest payment from Government – nearly three quarters of a million to support up to 105 staff over five months. In October, it was confirmed that the company would be laying off more than half of its workforce due to the pandemic’s impact on travel, which saw passenger numbers drop 90%.

Blue Islands, which signed a £10m deal with Government to protect the island’s air links in July, claimed around £405,000 across the six month period to support up to 61 of its workers.

Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, which launched an emergency ‘Love Your Zoo’ appeal in June after the pandemic slashed its income by 80%, needed the highest level of payroll support of any local charity. It was given £390,000 over three months to help up to 131 staff.

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Pictured: Durrell made the highest claim of any charity, needing £390,000 over three months to help up to 131 staff.

Jersey Hospice, which said its future was hanging in the balance in March, required £241,000 to support up to 80 jobs over four months.

The Government says in the report that updates to the data “will be released when possible, for example, for CFPS phase three and four together with other support schemes.”

Sector breakdown for all businesses receiving payroll support between March and August…

Hotels, restaurants and bars – £21,016,279.45

Construction – £18,236,304.61

Wholesale and retail – £12,570,096.84

Education, Health and other services – £10,972,044.83

Miscellaneous business activities – £8,548,266.42

Transport and storage – £4,345,549.33

Manufacturing – £2,054,477.38

Information and communication – £1,106,303.78

Finance and legal – £1,100,726.28 

Agriculture and fisheries – £771,243.64

Utilities and waste – £260,055.76

The top 50 claimants…

  1. Randalls – £1,043,296.57, supporting up to 328 jobs over five months

  2. Liberation Group – £952,246.89, up to 247 jobs over four months

  3. Swissport – £748,897.91, up to 105 jobs over five months

  4. Royal Yacht Hotel – £694,458.66, up to 195 jobs over six months

  5. Jacksons (CI) Limited – £620,071.73, up to 142 jobs over three months

  6. A De Gruchy and Co Ltd – £587,811.99, up to 145 jobs over six months

  7. Hotel de France Limited – £573,816.36, up to 91 jobs over six months

  8. St. Brelade’s Bay Hotel Properties Limited – £545,130.76, up to 87 jobs over six months

  9. Modern Hotels (Holdings) Ltd – £492,040.21, up to 90 jobs over six months

  10. Dandara – £486,283.10, up to 236 jobs over three months

  11. Grand Holdings Ltd – £479,341.69, up to 94 jobs over six months

  12. Voisins Department Store Limited – £462,983.29, 138 jobs over four months

  13. JP Mauger Ltd – £455,288.14, up to 60 over five months

  14. Norman Limited – £451,506.25, 157 jobs over two months

  15. Seymours (Services) Limited – £448,041.36, up to 225 jobs over six months

  16. Ferryspeed – £430,195.77, up to 142 jobs over two months

  17. Hotel L’Horizon – £421,158.76, up to 78 jobs over six months

  18. Blue Islands – £404,765.19, up to 61 jobs over five months

  19. Angorabesco – £395,560.29, up to 59 jobs across six months

  20. Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust – £390,279.59, up to 131 jobs over three months

  21. Pomme D’Or Hotel (1932) Limited – £375,459.30, up to 68 jobs over five months

  22. Merton Hotel Limited – £367,336.81, up to 62 jobs over five months

  23. Pentagon (Jersey) Wholesale Limited – £365,892.00, up to 87 staff over three months

  24. Amalgamated Facilities Management Limited – £354,552.79, up to 168 jobs over two months

  25. Longueville Manor – £351,671.88, up 73 staff over six months 

  26. Style Shopfitting Limited – £344,272.80, up to 51 jobs over five months

  27. Les Ormes Golf and Leisure Village – £334.752.96, up to 45 jobs over six months

  28. Casual Dining Services Limited – £332,380.66, up to 69 jobs over five months

  29. Jersey Evening Post – £332,223.50, 79 jobs over three months

  30. BG Romeril & Company Limited – £318,198.48, up to 112 jobs over two months

  31. Radisson Blu – £317,396.81, up to 71 jobs over six months

  32. JP Restaurants – £305,828 – up to 65 jobs, five months

  33. Centre Point Trust – £281,793.17, up to 71 jobs over four months

  34. Spellbound Holdings Limited – £270,670.21, up to 61 jobs over three months

  35. The Sigma Group Limited – £267,895.63, up to 38 jobs over five months

  36. Jayen Limited – £253,192.40, up to 43 jobs over three months

  37. Hotel La Place – £246,373.66, up to 36 jobs over six months

  38. La Petite Ecole Jersey Ltd – £246,128.19, up to 57 jobs over three months

  39. The Club Hotel & Spa – £244,785.16, up to 42 jobs over six months

  40. Jersey Hospice Care – £241,399.38, up to 80 jobs over four months

  41. Cimandis – £236,690.73, up to 31 jobs over six months

  42. Jersey Rugby Football Club (2016) Trading – £228,535,75, up to 49 jobs over four months

  43. Airline Services (CI) Limited – £215,0032.86, up to 35 jobs over six months

  44. Jersey Oyster Company Limited – £210,277.57, up to 31 jobs over six months 

  45. Pizza Express (Jersey Limited) – £207,074.25, up to 50 jobs over six months

  46. AE Surcouf & Sons Ltd – £204,336.09, up to 36 jobs over five months

  47. Hotel De Normandie – £203,535.10, up to 36 jobs over six months

  48. AC Mauger and Son – £202,572.00, up to 31 jobs over five months

  49. The Atlantic Hotel – £197,841.93, up to 41 jobs over five months

  50. Gordon Electrical Services Limited – £195,210.00, up to 28 jobs over five months