Hello,

As Summer gives way to Autumn and States business fully resumes, we’re following events with a keen eye, and we’ve been incredibly encouraged by most of what we’ve seen at this early stage.

We are delighted that a Tax Review Sub Committee has been formed, in line with the recommendation we made in our manifesto. If you’ve read “Our Plan for Guernsey 2025-29 and Beyond”, you will know that we support a staged approach to reform of our fiscal system, as we don't think that the States should be asking people to pay more in the form of GST+ until it has both explored other revenue raising options and taken steps to contain spending.

Our manifesto set out a plan to redesign a low-tax system based on the principles of fairness, simplicity, sustainability, competitiveness, certainty and distortion – i.e. incentivising individuals and businesses to make decisions for the right reasons, not for tax reasons. We are pleased to see these important principles have made it into the terms of reference for the tax review.

The experts we worked with on our fiscal policy working group set out a clear ambition for the new States Assembly to prepare a revised tax and social security package by March 2026. Now, it seems that’s going to happen, and we might finally see an end to the “to GST or not to GST” debate in the coming months.

We were also heartened to see that the Scrutiny Committee has the States Property Unit in its sights for a potential review. Our manifesto called for the whole unit to be replaced with a new publicly owned company, similar to the Guernsey Housing Association or the Guernsey Development Agency. The States’ property assets are wide-ranging and of significant value. Recent events have demonstrated the complexities in managing these assets, not to mention the fact that a number of States-owned sites ripe for much-needed housing development are still lying dormant. We will be watching how the proposed review progresses with interest…

In just a few weeks, the new States Assembly will release its first Budget of the term. Whilst we don’t expect it will make for easy reading, we do hope it will offer clear direction – something we have been calling for since we launched Future Guernsey. 

As for us, we have some exciting plans in the works, which we hope to announce in the coming months – so watch this space!