Can these prices be justified?

However, although day-to-day experience allows people to make judgments about the cost of living, recent analysis of the price of goods has thrown further light on what we are obliged to pay for so many necessities and luxuries.

This analysis, which drills down to the price of commodities after duties and GST are excluded, has provided Treasury Minister Philip Ozouf with ammunition to ask searching questions about the way in which Island traders price what they sell.

Giving evidence before the Corporate Services Scrutiny Panel, Senator Ozouf asked why traders’ mark-ups were so high. Moreover, he said that this was an issue that had perplexed him throughout the 13 years that he had spent in politics.

That the Senator, an avowed devotee of free market economics, was so forthright about what he regards to be excessive profits is without doubt significant. It is also significant that he urged those making high profits to cease hiding behind the ‘myth’ that high prices were due exclusively to the high cost of doing business here.

It is, of course, true that freight costs, relatively high wages – in part driven, it must be said, by the high cost of living – and high rentals are factors. That said, as the Senator pointed out, compensations come in the shape of low business rates and low social security contributions.

This candid evidence to Scrutiny will be welcomed by many. It will be even more welcome because of its source. As well as speaking with a high degree of authority, Senator Ozouf is as well placed as anyone to influence changes in pricing policies if they are shown to be appropriate.

If indeed there has, over many years, been some conspiracy of silence over Jersey traders’ margins, the Senator could well be the person to lift the veil –though any action he takes will have to be at least as direct as his responses to the Scrutiny panel’s inquiries.