I will be very happy to hand over my tax affairs

However, there is one archaic tradition that I am really looking forward to – being able to hand over all my tax affairs to the man of the house and let him sort it out.

Yep, that’s right, I completely loathe filling in my annual tax return and will be more than happy to just let him get on with it while I remain blissfully unaware that it is even that time of year again.

It was with this in mind that I read with interest the comments of Advocate Barbara Corbett, a partner at law firm Hanson Renouf, this week. She described the Jersey tax law which automatically regards a married woman’s earnings to be her husband’s income as ‘ridiculous’ and urged the States to review it.

Similarly, two female States Members, Deputies Jackie Hilton and Tracey Vallois, said the law was outdated, with the first even going as far as to say that it was ‘another example of Jersey lagging behind other jurisdictions when it comes to equality’.

And she is completely right. I may hate filling in my tax return and already have everything in place to hand over to my husband-to-be, but that is only because I feel that it doesn’t really affect me. I am happy, content and am in a trusting, equal relationship.

But what about those women who aren’t? What about those in controlling relationships, those so dominated by their other half that they dare not question what the man of the house does and says for fear of what might happen? There are lots of them out there, from all walks of society, sadly more than we all realise.

And what about those women who simply believe, for whatever reason, that the system whereby a man can sign a box so his wife can discuss her own tax affairs is backward, and worse, totally sexist? Don’t they deserve more than the ability to ‘get permission’ to control their own lives?

But there is a wider issue here, and that is the ongoing acceptance of the way we do many things in this Island simply because they have always been done that way. (Think Sunday trading, and even the make-up of the States itself, as other examples.)

I am, perhaps, representative of the many younger people in Jersey who are currently torn between a love of tradition, pomp and ceremony and the modernity and changing nature of the world in which we now live.

Both can, I believe, exist side by side, but we shouldn’t keep tradition for tradition sake.

People often talk of the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ in Jersey when it comes to wealth, but it applies also to equality.

For too long things have gone unchanged because those in power simply aren’t affected by them. If, like me, it doesn’t really bother them who fills out the tax forms and they have never been in a position where it would, many don’t afford much time to the issue.

Sure, constituents may come to them with concerns and some will take them up, but for many, a lot of issues will never even register on their radar. Like me, they may consider what it means to them, but when you aren’t affected it is harder to care and easier to just carry on with things as they have always been. Because change costs money, time and energy and unless someone kicks up a big stink life just continues to plod along as it always has done.

Yes, we should work with what we have got and yes, ‘if it aint broke don’t fix it’ and all that, but just because something works fine for you doesn’t mean it isn’t broken for others.

I may not care if my husband has all the power when it comes to our tax affairs, and many others may not be bothered (what the article featuring Advocate Corbett’s comments didn’t say was that many other politicians, legal professionals and even so-called discrimination campaigners didn’t want to comment) but some people are bothered.

And, if we really think about it and consider the issue, even the most apathetic of us can probably see that the law needs revising.

Talking of kicking up a stink, I thought it appropriate that I afford some space to the spat that has been going on this week between Deputies Montfort Tadier and St Brelade Constable Steve Pallett.

The latter accused his colleague of asking ‘pointless’ question in the States for political gain after the Deputy raised fears over the future of St Brelade’s Youth Club, of which the Constable is chairman.

While everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I am sure there is a lot more going on behind the scenes than we will ever know, it does seem a bit silly.

In fact, the pair are dangerously close to returning to the petty personality politics that our elected representatives have so eagerly told us is a thing of the past.

It is also worth remembering that, as independent Members, each of our politicians is allowed to lodge whatever questions they like, within certain procedural guidelines.

They do so not only because what they say in the House is privileged, thus allowing the media to report it in all its glory, but because it is the perfect way to kick up the kind of stinks I have said above are so crucial.

Sure, you are always going to get a few questions that will only affect a minority, or ones that have been asked so many times before that we could all give the answer, but that is par for the course. Instead, it is up to us to vote in the people who will ask the right questions.

After all, it isn’t called privilege for nothing.