Who's getting the message?
The States will finally be publishing its proposals to change the island’s tax system next week. It’s almost certain that you won’t like it – which maybe explains why the States seems keen to control the message as tightly as it can at launch on Monday.
Unusually, the media may interview politicians about the plans on Saturday, but reporters are not being guaranteed early access to the full report. You won’t be reading about it in Monday’s Guernsey Press, because an embargo has been inconveniently set for 12 noon on that day.
The States will put out its own messages through its own channels and then reinforce that with a public meeting that evening, which will involve a presentation before questions from the floor.
What might they be saying? It feels like we’ve been primed to expect more of the same with a goods and services tax. But now there's a focus on a ‘package of measures’ aimed to make tax ‘fairer’. But don't expect corporate tax to fill much of a gap.
Policy & Resources may believe that its dire warnings about the state of public finances are starting to have some impact among political colleagues. But how many will be prepared to do ‘a Helyar’ and completely change tack?
But we still don’t know how hard P&R will try to sell this package to islanders, when arguably it’s deputies they really need to convince.