Excessive taxation is destroying our economies

In my Guernsey of half a century or more ago there certainly was a ‘Guernsey way’, which meant that our small size enabled us to avoid much of the red tape and bureaucracy that was apparent in the UK, and we could concentrate on practical matters and caring about other people.

It did not mean closing the airport when an aircraft was expected, and it did not mean following UK vices such as railways inconveniencing commuters with strikes, or NHS staff causing life-changing harm to patients through strikes, and so many other things of that ilk.

When I was in my youth in the late Fifties and early Sixties I believed that the world was getting better. Things were changing and lives were being improved. Since that time we have lived through a long period of generally increasing affluence and great technological advances.

But many things today seem worse than they did then, even though so many things are so much better, and really we should be hugely happy. So if we aren’t, then why aren’t we?

The sociological aspects of this are beyond the scope of this letter, and would require a book in themselves, if there was anybody still around who was sufficiently detached to write it.

But the purely financial aspects are of great concern to many or most, and this will increasingly be the case, since the present signs don’t look good for either Britain or Guernsey.

Neither of us have got the money to sustain the welfare state that we have developed and that helps to keep us in a way to which we’ve become accustomed and feel entitled. This sense of entitlement is an important factor. We are destroying our economies by excessive taxation and the fact that many people just don’t care about contributing to their country and their society.

And in Guernsey we’ve got an even worse housing problem than in the UK, since we haven’t really got enough land left on which to build unless we want to become wall-to-wall suburb.

Can the situation be retrieved? Is it too difficult a task for a democracy? One or two brave souls have tried. For example Liz Truss was in my view one of Lord Digby’s good persons who was beaten by a bad system, even if she did go at it like a bull at a gate. But the new Labour government has no interest in this, and is intent on more tax and spend which will only shrink the economy and prevent any growth. We can parody Sir Keir Starmer and say that things are going to get worse before they get even worse again.

That’s in the UK. But what of Guernsey?

Will our 2025 election provide any good persons who understand how things work, and who will not be beaten by the system? Time will tell.

BOB PERKINS

Les Corneilles

Rue de la Ronde Cheminee

Castel