Reciprocal health agreement would boost tourism
I SEE our Visit Guernsey people are spending half a million pounds on a TV advertising campaign. Would that money not have been better used funding a reciprocal health agreement? We attract visitors to our island and then if they fall ill we whack them for massive medical charges, which means they leave Guernsey with more resentment than happy memories. Not everyone can afford or even obtain travel insurance, both from visitors and locals going to the UK, and the lack of a reciprocal health agreement is keeping some Guernsey residents prisoners on their own island. Before I get shot down by the deputies, this was on the table in 2009, I believe, and it was vetoed because it was a cash cow for the Board of Health. The problem was that the visitors never paid and no one chased them for the money.
It seems to me that someone in Visit Guernsey is on an ego trip and is ignoring the expense for potential visitors of getting here, the poor travel links and the worry of something happening when they are here. Guernsey with no RHA and expensive travel or Jersey with cheap air fares, an RHA and lots more to see and do? As a Guernseyman it pains me to say it, but if I was in the UK it would be an absolute no-brainer, Jersey would get my vote every time.
So Visit Guernsey, get your priorities right, sort out the travel links, do something about travel costs and get the reciprocal health agreement reinstated. Then, and only then, should you be marketing our island.
TREVOR HOCKEY,
Trev's Motorcycles
Editor's footnote: The Committee for Economic Development's Marketing and Tourism declined to comment on this occasion.
