From Chris Whitworth.
THE recent statement from Assistant Treasury Minister Deputy Eddie Noel that the States are powerless to increase taxes paid by the super-rich 1(1K) immigrants is highly questionable.

The States, by its very nature, is there to introduce and amend the laws, if and when this becomes necessary. Consequently, if our elected members cannot correct errors made in the past then the system is severely flawed and in need of urgent reform.

Incredibly, this means that some of our wealthy immigrants could now be paying less tax than your average working person. A couple of thousand pounds in annual income tax negotiated in the 1970s would have been a useful amount then but in today’s terms is a mere pittance.

In these difficult times with the continual reductions in mortgage relief and personal allowances ensuring more and more people pay more and more tax, it is disgusting that the people who can most afford such increases are being protected.

Surely, our wealthiest residents realise that Jersey has been good to them and it is only morally right that they start paying a fair share in taxes.

As for the remark that 1(1K) residents are good for Jersey, I remain to be convinced.
I mean buying up land and putting up fences to keep us ordinary folk away does not seem like the type of people Jersey should be trying to encourage.

Perhaps it is time for an inquiry – similar to the incinerator débâcle – to be set up to investigate why such unfairness in the tax system was ever allowed in the first place.
Evanston,
Green Street,
St Helier.