Connect Me Funds (FOI)

Request  

Rivington Fund

A       

What is the total amount available in the Rivington Fund each quarter?

B       

What is the average amount of money applied for?

C       

What is the average amount awarded?

D       

What is the maximum amount that has been awarded to a single application, and how many travellers were part of this application?

E       

Who sits on the board of the Rivington Fund, and what other roles in Gov do these individuals hold?

ConnectMe Fund

F       

Who sits on the board of the Connect Me Fund, and what other roles in Gov do these individuals hold?

G       

How is a decision on funding for both Rivington and Connect Me arrived at - is it some kind of democratic process amongst 'the board' or do certain individuals hold authority on final decisions?

Response

A       

The administrators (Board) have set a target of £25,000 of awards per quarter, correlating to a typical income value.

B       

The average award applied for this year to-date is £10,881 including those declined (4).

C       

The average amount awarded this year to-date is £3,725.

D       

The maximum award this year to-date in a single application was £12,883, this was to fund a trip for 13 people.

E       

The membership is nominated one each by Jersey Heritage, Jersey Arts Trust and the Department for Economy, and meetings observed by Senior Lead – Arts, Department for the Economy.

F       

When deciding whether to release the names of individual staff members it is necessary to take into account a number of factors such as -

• whether disclosure is linked to other sensitive personal information
• the reasonable expectation of the employee for their name to be released into the public domain
• whether there is a legitimate public interest in the release
• the rights and freedoms of the employee
• the potential consequences of disclosure.

In this instance it is not believed that there is a wider legitimate public interest in releasing the names of these individual staff members, other than that of the Director. The release would only serve to satisfy a single requester. Article 25 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 has been applied.

The panel for the ConnectMe grants involved a number of officers, who hold the following posts:

• Disability Inclusion Officer
• Diversity and Inclusion Consultant
• Sector Lead Arts
• Chief Librarian
• Culture and Heritage Officer
• Heath and Community Services – People and Culture Officer
• Director of Local Services – Paul McGinnety
• Local Services Manager
  

G       

Awards are determined by a democratic process by the board of administrators, with no individuals holding the authority on final decisions. In the case of the Rivington Fund, applications are assessed against the purposes of the fund and the extent to which the applicant and their proposal fit against the fund's criteria. In the case of the ConnectMe fund, applications are assessed by their ability to support the objectives of the fund and wider Government of Jersey Strategy.

 Article applied

 Article 25 - Personal information

(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it constitutes personal data of which the applicant is the data subject as defined in the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2005.

(2) Information is absolutely exempt information if –

(a) it constitutes personal data of which the applicant is not the data subject as defined in the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2005; and

(b) its supply to a member of the public would contravene any of the data protection principles, as defined in that Law.

3) In determining for the purposes of this Article whether the lawfulness principle in Article 8(1)(a) of the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2018 would be contravened by the disclosure of information, paragraph 5(1) of Schedule 2 to that Law (legitimate interests) is to be read as if sub-paragraph (b) (which disapplies the provision where the controller is a public authority) were omitted. 

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