Tax review is looking like a tough sell

This debate has not caught the imagination, nor been seen to significant enhance the understanding of the majority of the electorate.

Secondly, the same applies for their fellow States members.

Hence a late round of meetings and briefings for deputies, and a late publicity offensive.

But it appears even briefings for the political animals on the douzaines appear to have not truly convinced.

And then the Guernsey Party piled in yesterday with a very long statement along lines which won’t disappoint any of their ‘supporters’.

Deputy Roffey immediately described the Guernsey Party’s 11th-hour contribution on the whole tax review as ‘recycled nonsense’ and ‘populist’.

But while some may now get the demands of the demographic time bomb and its impact on future States finances and policies, islanders remain to be convinced that the States needs to raise the best part of £80m., feeling there is a lack of evidence that, as the Guernsey Party state, ‘no stone has been left unturned’.

They might hear States members argue that cuts alone won’t save enough money to duck tax increases, but they remain sceptical.

They might reflect, or take a quick online search, to find former Treasury minister Deputy Parkinson speaking enthusiastically as long ago as 2012: ‘At the moment we know what we are spending on departments like Education and Health and Social Services, but until we are in a position where we can ask the searching financial questions, we’re not really sure whether what we’re spending is the right amount.’

Nothing seems to have changed on that score. And that’s a big reason why the tax review may well leave the States with much more to think about than they hoped by the weekend.

If there’s now a sales pitch going on for a GST, it looks like it is proving to be a very tough sell.