Jersey climate change panel was 'three times over budget'

An investigation into climate change in Jersey cost more than three times the expected budget, a committee has said.

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said it was among several concerns about the operations of citizens' panels, assemblies and juries.

PAC said the Citizens' Assembly on Climate Change had an initial budget of just over £86,000, but the total actual cost came in at about £191,000.

It said it would ask the government to evaluate the budgeting process.

The committee's report said it had been "examining the use and operation of deliberative practices in Jersey" for the Care Inquiry Legacy Citizens' Panel, the Our Hospital Citizens' Panel, the Citizens' Assembly on Climate Change, and the Assisted Dying Citizens' Jury.

The climate change assembly finished carried out its work from March to May 2021 after its contract was signed in February 2020.

It established "a forum of islanders to contribute to the development of policies and actions to be undertaken by the government of Jersey to confront the climate emergency and become carbon neutral".

But the PAC found the assembly raised concerns "regarding the quality of budgeting for this deliberative practice".

It said it was "strongly" recommending the government evaluated "this process and incorporate learnings into all future bodies, to avoid significant increases in budget".

It also said the citizens' panel looking into where to put the new hospital should have been overseen by a single department and "did not publish the identity of the external facilitator".

It said it was recommending that "all deliberative bodies are undertaken by a single department with a named external facilitator".

The PAC said it was to provide ministers "with a comprehensive set of recommendations for establishing new deliberative bodies".

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