IT has been said so often and for so long that it has taken on something of the air of a mantra: Jersey is one of the best places in the world to live.
The results of a new survey carried out by HSBC among expatriate employees therefore come as a bit of a shock and leave in their wake some intriguing questions for the Island’s political and economic leaders.
In short, the globetrotting finance industry employees in question beg to differ from the long-presumed view. Far from being the golden focus of their career dreams and ambitions, Jersey features ignominiously at number 15 out of 15 in a list of desirable destinations for expatriate money men and women.
Surveys of this kind must, of course, be taken with a pinch of salt. There is a reason why they tend to surface during summer’s so-called silly season for news.
Nevertheless, the survey’s findings, reported on Friday, merit some serious consideration at a time when Jersey is agonising about its long-term future, its seemingly intractable housing problems and its economic over-dependence on this particular line of work.
Many difficult political decisions have been taken because of the increasingly competitive nature of the offshore world, not least the recent imposition of tax increases on the rest of the community. Time and again, the Island authorities have emphasised the need to recruit high-calibre staff to maintain that competitive edge.
It will therefore cause at least a tremor of concern to find that expatriate employees, responding to a survey by a major financial institution which chose Jersey as its offshore HQ, should be so disillusioned with what it has to offer in terms of earning ability, security and quality of life.
The relationship between the finance industry and the Island as a whole is, in many ways, Jersey’s proverbial ‘elephant in the living room’, a problem everyone can see but is too embarrassed or baffled to talk about. Finance’s vital contribution to the economy is well understood but, despite continuing efforts and progress, there is a long way to go before it fully wins the hearts and minds of the majority. If even those who come here to work in the industry are not as happy with the arrangements as many have long assumed them to be, the issue becomes more challenging still.