This Is Guernsey

By Nicci Martel

EDUCATION says it has spent £130,000 of taxpayers’ money on settling claims made by former senior department employees.

Chief Minister Mike Torode told the States yesterday, in response to an question from Deputy Brian de Jersey, that in the last seven years two senior management staff had taken early retirement and two left in an unexplained manner. Each individual made a claim against the States and were awarded an undisclosed sum of money out of Education’s budget.

Asked by Deputy John Gollop if the terms of these settlements would ever be made public, Deputy Torode’s response was that it was a confidential matter between employee and employer only.

Deputy Torode hoped his answers would ‘help put to bed the lies about the cost of making staff redundant’ and the ‘myth it has cost the States £1m.’.

He claimed that the two employees who had left before normal retirement age did not result in any cost to the taxpayer because they were funded entirely through the Teachers’ Pension Fund.

But this in itself is made up of employee and employer contributions and the employer is the States.

Deputy de Jersey said the answers had not been satisfactory and he regretted not asking how much the hearings and litigation in these cases had cost.