Locum Health staff (FOI)

​Request

A
How many locum health staff have the States of Jersey brought over to the island in over the last five years, broken down into nurses, consultants, allied health professionals, doctors and social workers?

B
What was the total cost each year, for the last five years, for external agency staff in Health and Community Services?

C
How many vacancies are there currently in the health sector, including nurses, consultants, allied health professionals, doctors and social workers?

Response

A
Information is not held centrally and it is estimated that to review the financial data held on different systems and define how many locums had been employed, as on occasions one vacancy may be covered by several locums, would take in excess of the 12.5 hours limit under Regulation 2(1) of the Freedom of Information (Costs) (Jersey) Regulations 2014.

B

 C
As at the end of January 2020 there were c.324 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) posts vacant.

Articles applied

Article 16 A scheduled public authority may refuse to supply information if cost excessive

(1) A scheduled public authority that has been requested to supply information may refuse to supply the information if it estimates that the cost of doing so would exceed an amount determined in the manner prescribed by Regulations.

Regulation 2 (1) of the Freedom of Information (Costs) (Jersey) Regulations 2014 allows an authority to refuse a request for information where the estimated cost of dealing with the request would exceed the specified amount of the cost limit of £500. This is the estimated cost of one person spending 12.5 working hours in determining whether the department holds the information, locating, retrieving and extracting the information.