All meetings related to the DFDS contract (FOI)

​Request

Please provide a list of all meetings related to the DFDS contract decisions, talks, negotiations since 1 November and their attendees.

Response

Bid assessment meetings for the Jersey-only ferry services procurement were held with both commercial bidders on Thursday 21st and Friday 22nd November 2024.  

In addition to representatives of both bidding commercial parties, the following Jersey Officers were present at the bid assessment meetings:

• Chief Officer for Infrastructure, Housing and Environment as Senior Responsible Officer for the ferry services procurement 
• Head of Investment Appraisal – Treasury
• Sector Lead of Aviation and Maritime – Department for the Economy
• Director of Strategic Procurement – Commercial Services
• Category Lead – Commercial Services
• Jersey Harbourmaster – Ports of Jersey Ltd
• Chief Executive Officer – Ports of Jersey Ltd

Following the selection of DFDS as the preferred bidder, one-to-one negotiations were held between Government of Jersey and DFDS. The details of these meetings are exempt under Article 33 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011.

Articles applied

Article 33 - Commercial interests

Information is qualified exempt information if –

(a) it constitutes a trade secret; or

(b) its disclosure would, or would be likely to, prejudice the commercial interests of a person (including the scheduled public authority holding the information).

Public Interest Test 

Article 33 (b) is a prejudice-based exemption. That means that to engage this exemption there must be a likelihood that disclosure would cause prejudice to the interest that the exemption protects. In addition, this is a qualified exemption, and consideration must be given to the public interest in maintaining the exemption.

The Scheduled Public Authority (SPA) considers that providing information could prejudice the commercial interests of the Government of Jersey and / or third parties. There may be public interest in the commercial information, however it was considered that this is outweighed by the potential for commercial and or financial damage.​