THIS COLUMN yesterday looked to answer the question to be posed at the forthcoming Institute of Directors annual conference: would you invest in Guernsey plc?

Given events over the last few months, however, the question might more accurately be posed as: are you allowed to invest in Guernsey plc?

Guernsey’s financial services sector – never the most outspoken – is increasingly concerned that unannounced, unheralded and undebated, the regulatory screw is being turned with an enthusiasm that is detrimental to the island. In particular, barriers are being erected to new businesses wanting to start small and then expand.

And these fears span the entire range of finance here, from banking through investment to the fiduciary sector.

Traditionally, Guernsey has encouraged small operations and those with entrepreneurial vision. There are operations in the finance sector that are now significant employers despite a modest beginning, and the industry concern is that such start-ups have effectively been regulated out of the question.

It is a route that Jersey disastrously went down and took a decade to recover from and the real anxiety is who has decided that excessive regulation is in the best interests of the island.

Executives who are dependent on the Guernsey Financial Services Commission for their livelihood tend not to criticise it openly but the concerns are widespread and actually surfaced in public earlier this year after the commission released its draft code of corporate governance.

Having a well regulated financial services sector is good for the island, but who is deciding what level of control is appropriate to Guernsey’s needs and on what evidence?

If, as the sector detects, there has been a significant change in the way the commission is wielding its considerable powers, what has triggered that and what political process sanctioned it?

Commerce and Employment has to be aware of the industry’s concerns and it won’t have proposed more regulation and the States has not.

With regulation being such a key factor in the way Guernsey attracts business, there is another question the IoD might like to pose: just who regulates the regulator?