The presentation given by Lindsay de Sausmarez on behalf of Guernsey’s Policy and Resources Committee to the Alderney Chamber of Commerce on the 15 June was a well-orchestrated example of how easy it is to twist people around one’s little finger, by using a subtle form of sales hypnosis that can be both visually and verbally effective. Before entering politics, Lindsay de Sausmarez’s background was primarily in the creative and media industries, working for many years as a television and media producer, including a long tenure within the creative department at Specsavers. So she has developed a well polished style of sales acumen, which no doubt is unfortunately able to convince some, that these tax proposals are in our best interests.
Before politicians even mention a new tax, they have to prepare the ground by getting people worried about what will happen if they don’t introduce it. If you just announce a tax, people get angry. But if you try to convince them that the island’s schools, hospitals and pensions are on the verge of collapsing because the old way of taxing businesses isn’t bringing in enough money anymore, everything changes. Suddenly, you aren’t just taking their money, you are offering them a shield to protect their way of life. The conversation stops being about ‘the government is greedy’ and becomes ‘we have to save our island.’
A classic negotiation tactic is not to start asking for the 3% – you start by floating a higher number – like 5%. People panic, there is an outcry and the politicians ‘listen to the public’ and drop it down to 3% as a compromise. By doing this, the debate completely flips. Instead of arguing about whether Guernsey should have a GST at all, everyone starts concentrating on the number. People feel like they won a victory by beating the government down to 3%, and they accept the tax because it feels a lot better than the 5% they were opposed to.
To make the medicine go down, you have to pair it with immediate, obvious rewards. You tell people, ‘Yes, things will cost 3% more at the till, but look over here: we are lowering your income tax, raising your personal allowance and cutting fuel duty.’ The human brain loves instant gratification. When people look at their payslip and see more money in their pocket right now, it feels great. The fact that they are losing a few pennies here and there on every single grocery trip or haircut doesn’t register the same way. It is a slow bleed that is hard to calculate, so the swap feels to some like a winning deal.
Finally, you have to assure people that this thing won’t grow into a monster. You promise them that there will be a cap and that it will be officially reviewed in a few years’ time. This calms people down because it makes them feel safe and in control. But the real victory for the politician isn’t the 3% rate – it is getting the system built, setting up the software and getting the civil service departments primed to collect GST. Once that massive machinery is up and running in the background, raising GST to 4% – 5% – or even 10% or more, a few years hence takes no more than a simple vote, as the infrastructure is already in place. You’ve successfully built the vehicle and the public will be too busy arguing about the proposed percentage rise to demand its dismantlement.
In short, the promotion of the 3% GST package can be seen as an exercise in political and administrative framing that serves bureaucratic self-interest while exploiting public vulnerability, they are attempting to facilitate this by framing Guernsey’s financial deficit purely as an unavoidable demographic crisis, the narrative protects the civil service from aggressive downsizing or structural budget cuts, shifting the blame away from public sector spending growth by mentioning an intention to make some cuts, albeit only comparatively minor ones.
They are bundling the GST with immediate sweeteners like a lower income tax band, exploiting a psychological bias toward visible and instant rewards, thus masking the compounding lifetime friction of a permanent consumption tax.
The ‘efficiency’ of the tax is achieved by outsourcing the administrative friction and cost of collection to local high street businesses, while quietly shifting a higher proportion of the long-term tax burden onto daily living costs.
Promising that the rate will remain capped at 3% for a couple of years pacifies immediate public resistance. In reality, the true bureaucratic victory is establishing the complex machinery of collection. But as we have already said, once the infrastructure is embedded, raising the rate in the future becomes an effortless administrative adjustment.
Bear in mind that we cannot even permanently fix the level of the aforementioned sweeteners and the percentage of GST charged to us, as both could still be subject to change in the future because, unlike some jurisdictions, we have no written constitution to legally bind them to.
We must resist this large scale political manipulation by a pervasive civil service, who only want what is in their own self-interest. If we open the door and accept these proposals, we will be seen as being complicit enablers and not as intelligent critical thinkers – like I trust we all are.
Colin Perry
Alderney
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