Annual income from interconnector cables on seabed (FOI)

​​​​​​Original request

Please provide the annual income accruing to the Government of Jersey since 2015 when it recevied ownership of the territorial seabed and foreshore. This would be from any leases or licenses it has granted to place interconnector cables and the like on or beneath the seabed and foreshore and paid by utility providers including, but not limited to, JE Plc, Guernsey Electricity, Electricité​ de France, Jersey Telecom and any other related entities. 

Please also explain the policy rationale in the event that the Government of Jersey is not presently maximising revenues from these valuable assets in the same manner as, for instance, the Crown Estate and Scottish Government do in the UK.

Original response​

Please see the following link to a Ministerial Decision relating to the transfer of the asset from the Crown to the public. 

Seabed and Foreshore - Jersey: Transfer to Public from the Crown (gov.je)

In addition, the link below indicates that there was a Ministerial Decision on 29 June 2015 to approve the grant of rights in perpetuity to Jersey Electricity PLC in respect of a cable wayleave across the Foreshore and Field 387 at Greve de Lecq, St. Ouen.

Jersey Electricity Cable Wayleave: Foreshore and Field 387, Greve de Lecq, St. Ouen: Grant of Rights (gov.je)​

As this information is publicly available, Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 has been applied. 

No further information is held by the Government of Jersey in this regard; therefore Article 3 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 applies.

Articles applied 

Article 3 - Meaning of “information held by a public authority”

For the purposes of this Law, information is held by a public authority if –

(a)     it is held by the authority, otherwise than on behalf of another person; or

(b)     it is held by another person on behalf of the authority.

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, w

​Internal Review Request

Respectfully, it completely fails to provide the information sought, if the annual revenue is zero, or some greater amount, why is this not disclosed?  Surely either Jersey Property Holdings or the Treasury must know how much (if any) revenue it derives annually from the seabed and/or foreshore from the various operators who have installed cables etc. thereon.  To be clear, I have not sought any commercially sensitive information, just the total annual sum paid to the States.

The response also fails to address the question of the policy framework around the exploitation for gain of the seabed and/or foreshore.  If there is no policy, I would have expected to have been told so.  If there is one, then this has not been provided via some form of Ministerial Decision.

The link to the wayleave provided is incomplete, giving only the Ministerial Decision but no link to the supporting papers underlying the rationale around granting the rights or if so on what basis.

May I please ask for this response to be reviewed and the information sought provided in a comprehensible form?

Internal Review Response

This review has been completed by a senior staff member of the Government of Jersey, independent of the original decision-making process. 

The original response has been reviewed and assessed.

It was concluded that the fact that no income was being paid to the Government of Jersey, and the Policy Rationale for this arrangement, as noted in the Written Report supporting Ministerial Decision PH-2015-0076, could be disclosed as follows: 

‘No consideration is being paid by JE [Jersey Electricity] to the Public for the grant of rights due to the benefits to the Island of the proposed cable installation.’

It was considered whether the Written Report in its entirety should remain exempt under Article 33(b) of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 as it related to a binding agreement with a third-party provider. They considered that Article 33(b) remains applicable, as it was not considered appropriate to release some of the details contained as they could disadvantage the Government of Jersey in any future negotiations, so they are therefore withheld. They also assessed that the Supporting Documents for Ministerial Decision MD-PH-2015-0076 (as linked below), should be published as they were originally identified as public but not currently available on gov.je.

Jersey Electricity Cable Wayleave: Foreshore and Field 387, Greve de Lecq, St. Ouen: Grant of Rights (gov.je)​

SD1 - JE Cable Wayleave - Foreshore and Field 387, Greve de Lecq, St Ouen - Grant of Rights.pdf

SD2 - JE Cable Wayleave - Foreshore and Field 387, Greve de Lecq, St Ouen - Grant of Rights.pdf

SD3 - JE Cable Wayleave - Foreshore and Field 387, Greve de Lecq, St Ouen - Grant of Rights.pdf

​Article 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).