Statutory Nuisances (Jersey) Regulations 2017 (FOI)

Request

On 3 October 2017 the Statutory Nuisances (Jersey) Regulations 2017 came into force. Under the Regulations the feeding of any wild animal, bird, insect, reptile or fish in such a place or manner as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance constitutes a statutory nuisance under Article 2(1)(m) of the Statutory Nuisances (Jersey) Law 1999.

A.

In the period 3 October 2017 to 3 April 2023 please state – Number of complaints received about a statutory nuisance - give 'All complaints' and 'Complaints relating to the feeding of any wild animal, bird, insect, reptile or fish in such a place or manner as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance'.

B

The number of complaints where a 'statutory notice' has been issued by the Minister - give 'All complaints' and 'Complaints relating to the feeding of any wild animal, bird, insect, reptile or fish in such a place or manner as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance'.

C

Please provide the policy document(s) used by the Environmental Health Department to manage a complaint about a statutory nuisance and which explain the circumstances in which a member of the public will be advised to pursue their own legal case rather than the Minister issue a statutory notice.

Response

A

The following table details the categories of statutory nuisance investigations carried out by the Environmental and Consumer Protection (ECP) team, formerly Environmental Health, for the requested period.  

It should be noted that these are recorded under the primary cause category on ECP’s systems.

In order to protect the identity of individuals, disclosure control has been applied to any investigation figures that are five or less, therefore Article 25 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 has been applied.

It should be noted that ECP investigations are primarily carried out following the receipt of a complaint, an enquiry or as the result of intelligence received.

Complaints relating to the feeding of any wild animal, bird, insect, reptile or fish in such a place or manner as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance are generally categorised Animal, Bird, Insect, and so on.  However, on occasion they could be categorised differently such as noise, premises prejudicial to health or similar, depending on the nature of the original primary complaint. 

It should be noted that not all cases recorded in the Animal, Bird, Insect category relate to feeding.

The systems are not configured in a way that will enable extraction of the details requested.  A manual search of records would be required in order to obtain this information. 

It has been estimated that it would take in excess of 12.5 working hours to locate and retrieve the data.  Therefore, this part of the request will not be processed further.

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. 

B

21 statutory notices, deemed to be abatement notices served under the Statutory Nuisances (Jersey) Law 1999, have been served by the Infrastructure and Environment department in relation to ECP cases during the requested period.

However, none of these relate to the feeding of any wild animal, bird, insect, reptile or fish in such a place or manner as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance.

C

The information requested is partially exempt under Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 as the following information is accessible on www.gov.je.

How officers investigate statutory nuisance complaints

Nuisance complaints (gov.je)

Enforcement policy

EHTSEnforcementPolicy2019.pdf (gov.je)

It is standard practice for complainants contacting ECP to be made aware of their rights in relation to nuisance type complaints, including the potential for private legal actions to be pursued.

A statutory notice will only be served under the Statutory Nuisances (Jersey) Law 1999 where a matter is deemed to constitute a statutory nuisance and more informal resolution measures have not secured compliance. 

Article 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. 

(2) Despite paragraph (1), a scheduled public authority may still supply the information requested on payment to it of a fee determined by the authority in the manner prescribed by Regulations for the purposes of this Article.

(3) Regulations may provide that, in such circumstances as the Regulations prescribe, if two or more requests for information are made to a scheduled public authority –

(a) by one person; or

(b) by different persons who appear to the scheduled public authority to be acting in concert or in pursuance of a campaign, the estimated cost of complying with any of the requests is to be taken to be the estimated total cost of complying with all of them.

Article 23 - Information accessible to applicant by other means

(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it is reasonably available to the applicant, otherwise than under this Law, whether or not free of charge.

(2) A scheduled public authority that refuses an application for information on this ground must make reasonable efforts to inform the applicant where the applicant may obtain the information.

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 2018.

(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 2018; and

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