Candidates missing vital key areas of issues

The vote-catching issues of education, taxation and development seem to lead the charge, yet all have missed the vital and underlying key areas associated with each. So what are these?

With over 30 years’ involvement in top international schools in 65 countries world-wide, I find no candidate shows interest in the crucial area of educating those who are either significantly educationally challenged or incredibly gifted. In class, the latter tend to become bored and potentially the most disruptive, often to be ‘diagnosed’ as ADHD and fed the drug Ritalin ‘to calm them down’, thereby successfully dumbing down the potential of the greatest gifts and brains of the future.

Have you ever wondered what it would have been like to try teach English to Shakespeare? Imagine the classroom ‘discussions’ about grammar and syntax. Today, Shakespeare might well have been diagnosed as ADHD and fed Ritalin, in which case the world would have had no Shakespeare. The same could be said of the disruptive Harrow pupil, Winston Churchill, in which case we might not have won WW2. My sister, Jacqueline du Pre, was so disruptive that my parents had to remove her from school. All she wanted to do was play the cello. With Ritalin, the world would have had no Jackie. Thankfully, very thankfully, Ritalin wasn’t around in those days.

And then we have the taxation issue with the threat of that dreadful tax, GST, an indiscriminate tax which affects everyone across the income spectrum. GST (VAT) is said to be the great solution to the island’s disposable income. Really? But why? Its administration is so very costly to the States as well as to businesses, requiring even more tax to be raised just to pay for it.

If it’s introduced, one of Guernsey’s key attractions of being VAT-free disappears. Instead, why not adjust or vary income tax rates for those with a higher income? So simple to manage and Guernsey keeps its VAT-free image. We hear about the High Street and how hard the shops are struggling. See how many emphasise VAT-free.

Finally, development, and those who want to ‘invest’ in Guernsey by reclaiming land and building restaurants and hotels on St Peter Port’s piers. Yet again they seek to despoil the sheer beauty of the island which attracts so many. Just look at Jersey and see what’s happened over the years to beautiful bays which have sprouted flats and hotels, and Jersey’s picturesque harbour which is now lined with a long line of technicolour flats on one of its piers.

I’m left with the feeling that those seeking election will only scratch the surface, shuffling the cards rather than finding a new pack, thereby condemning the island to a committee-led and mediocre future.

If alive now, I wonder what Renoir or Victor Hugo might say?

PIERS DU PRE