NEWS that Jersey is gearing up for unemployment to breach the 2,000 barrier in spring is worrying, especially since its current figure is already 1,530.

With that backdrop, its Council of Ministers’ decision to earmark £360,000 to fight the UK’s decision to close access to low value consignment relief is not just understandable, it is essential.

Jersey has around 2,000 jobs in the fulfilment sector and many of them provide the primary source of income for the individuals involved.

Here, the picture is rather different. There are officially 600 employed locally and many of those posts are part-time. That said, the extra income can be vital, perhaps to maintain a mortgage, or to mitigate the lack of private sector pay rises and bonuses or to pay for extras like holidays.

In Guernsey, too, fulfilment has enabled many without formal qualifications to find jobs that have enabled them to progress from simple tasks to more supervisory roles that have required training and development but that may not transfer readily outside the logistics arena.

Irrespective, both islands have every reason to fight hard to remove the discriminatory nature of the UK’s actions and to enable them to compete on a level playing field, the same plea made by independent music shops in Britain who claimed – wrongly – that the Channel Islands were destroying their business.

The decline of HMV on the high streets proves it. With an online presence here, the company is not destroying its own bricks and mortar business. That is being done by the price-slashing supermarkets and legal and illegal downloads of digital music.

What is more difficult to reconcile, however, is the gulf between what Guernsey says is needed to mount a legal challenge – £60,000 – and Jersey’s £360,000. If, as Jersey surmises, that’s the cost of the first action while it is budgeting for a worst-case outturn, then the Policy Council here risks being accused of seriously misleading islanders.

Perhaps it is only prepared to spend £60,000, but that would be short-sighted in view of the legal advice obtained by both islands.

If Guernsey is going to fight, it has to be prepared to go the distance – and be straight with taxpayers.