THE only mistake Guernsey have made with their advertisement which made a side-swipe at GST was apologising for it.

Their Health and Social Services advert for nurses read: ‘Welcome to Guernsey, a GST-free zone’. And it was published in the JEP. ‘So if you are a nurse with acute experience . . . why not swap GST for something a little more taxing and a little more fun?’ It is not subtle but then neither is GST.

It is fair to say that Jersey’s Health and Social Services were not going to take it well. Had it not been withdrawn, the advert could have made any future recruitment relations somewhat prickly, but still, you can’t help handing it to the Guerns for giving it a go.

And it is not as if the advert is inaccurate. It might be a bit unfair to poach between the islands but let’s face it, if we had the chance of ganging up on someone else’s jurisdiction in a similar vein no one would have held back.

Can our Health and Social Services bods in all honesty hold up their hands and say that they would not have had a go if the boot was on the other foot?

Oh, to have seen the e-mail exchanges and telephone conversations that the advert must have caused.

In many ways, this goes down as a great idea wasted because Jersey’s Health and Services didn’t like the joke. And, of course, you can see why, but come on, the ad man did his job.

The advert is opportunistic and eye-catching and topical. Whether it was pulled or not, no one can accuse him of not doing his job.

It is a great shame that Guernsey’s Health Minister Hunter Alan apologised and pulled his advert. After all, advertising warfare would have been far more fun. Maybe we just couldn’t come up with a pithy enough comeback so had a moan instead.