Covid-19 pandemic cost Guernsey £84m in 2020

The coronavirus pandemic cost Guernsey £83.9m in 2020.

The States accounts revealed the majority of the spending was on Covid support for islanders and totalled £51.3m.

Deputy Mark Helyar, the island's treasury lead, said he hoped focusing on island priorities could avoid any substantial tax rises.

However, he said a goods and services tax was not out of the question.

The States had expected the pandemic to cost the island £99.1m in 2020.

Deputy Helyar told the BBC the States was focussed currently on saving costs and getting the economy going again, "but we have to be honest about the cost that we have coming in the future".

The States-owned airline Aurigny lost £28.3m in 2020 because it had to reduce operations during the pandemic, the States revealed.

The accounts, published on Tuesday, also showed pay costs in 2020 across the public sector rose 0.8% in real terms, to £251m.

Deputy Helyar said costs in Jersey during the pandemic had been "substantially higher" and Guernsey had done various things in the second lockdown "to defray costs".

"We came out of lockdown faster and that's meant that we've saved more than we expected to spend."

Previously, Jersey announced it spent £190m in 2020 fighting coronavirus.

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