18 March 2014
The Population Office is focusing extra effort on gathering and validating the information provided by businesses as part of the manpower survey process.
Changes were introduced this year, requiring businesses to provide more detailed information on the residential status of their employees. This information supports the improvements in the management of migration which were established as part of the Control of Housing and Work Law.
For the first time, the Population Office is collecting data on every employee in Jersey, including their residential status and contract type. This will mean:
- the Population Office will be able to confirm whether businesses are complying with the terms of their licences.
- the information will help set up and maintain an accurate population register
- the data will provide new statistics, including the numbers of zero hour contract staff working in Jersey
To support businesses in dealing with this extra requirement, the deadline to provide information was extended to the end of February 2014. This has affected the ability of the Statistics Unit to publish statistics to their provisional schedule, and the Chief Statistician has postponed the labour market and population statistics until the necessary information is available.
The Director for Corporate Policy, Paul Bradbury, said “It is important we focus on collecting the required data, and then analysing and checking it thoroughly. We are accelerating this process to support the effective provision of statistics and we intend to conclude it next month.”
The Assistant Chief Minister, Senator Paul Routier, said “I am disappointed about this delay, but we are collecting more information about our workforce than ever before, and we appreciate that this takes more time.
“This process is essential if we are to achieve our goal of limiting migration - focusing it toward the highest value areas - while also supporting local employment. I have asked the Population Office to put all their effort into collecting the right information and checking its accuracy as quickly as possible.”
Paul Bradbury said “Over the last 8 months we have radically changed our regime of migration control. In many areas we have stripped out regulation, and in others we have significantly enhanced our controls, for example, registration cards for new employees, a population register, and detailed returns from all employers.
“We are continuing to improve our processes, and are working with businesses on this important issue.”
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