Low taxes don't help the poor
IS GUERNSEY failing its working poor by being prepared to do much more for the rich, and especially the immigrant rich?
Some may feel that the mere concept of Locate Guernsey is intrinsically wrong – though earlier this year the States said it was making £4 for every pound invested in its annual £325,000 budget.
What could that money do to help the poor? As it happens, probably not very much per head.
The Chief Minister’s view, broadcast on national radio on Friday evening, is that every States member is concerned about the poor and would do their best to try to improve the situation.
Is living on benefits in Guernsey a near-impossibility? ‘We pay what we can afford,’ said Deputy Peter Ferbrache.
One easy way to improve that? Left-leaning Guardian columnist Polly Toynbee had a view.
Choose to be low-tax (as the UK is, she argued), and you are where you are. Tax more and you can support more, she said.
Increasing taxes to support the poor in the island would be some debate, and possibly doomed to fail. But at least it would have an identifiable objective.
Guernsey’s current tax-raising debate seeks to pursue huge increases or new taxes for the island to stand still, to no-one’s obvious benefit. No wonder it’s not popular.