I moved to Guernsey in the Channel Islands from the UK in 2005 to work as a radio presenter and journalist at the island’s commercial radio station Island FM (by coincidence owned by the same company as this newspaper). Guernsey has it’s own government and, as a British Crown Dependency, a separate bureaucracy. Even when the UK was a member of the EU, Guernsey and the other CD’s (Jersey and the Isle of Man) were outside it. Having met my better half Bev during this time we decided last year it was time to move back to ‘the mainland’ so we could live in our own home in the South Hams at Woolwell on the edge of Plymouth. We had been renting the house out for a few years. We couldn’t afford to buy anything in Guernsey and even rental was sky high, though salaries were higher. The States of Guernsey Income Tax people asked us to fill out returns for the last tax year and this and we are still waiting for them to be processed.

England had changed in many ways in that 16 years and unfortunately not for the better. Little did we know that having crossed the English Channel, we’d soon be drowning in English red tape. Firstly we were faced with filling out a Transfer of Residency (TOR) form for HM Revenue & Customs itemising most things we were bringing back. I sold my car over there but my partner Bev decided to import hers. It was necessary to re-register it in the UK which took months and she was initially told we wouldn’t be allowed to drive it on Guernsey number plates so, needing a car, we decided we would have to buy another. It later transpired that as long as the paperwork had been sent off we could drive it after all. Passports were the next thing as we didn’t have any UK photo ID’s and our Guernsey-variant passports had just run out. Bank accounts were another headache. We had Guernsey accounts at Lloyds but when you leave the island you have to close them. We went to the main Plymouth branch of Lloyds and they could see our “offshore” accounts on their system but as we didn’t yet have UK ID’s they weren’t allowed to open UK accounts for us. We waited for our passports to arrive and when they eventually did we returned only to be told we would have to wait two months for an appointment to open them because of staff shortages and Covid. We then went to TSB in Tavistock who instantly opened our accounts so Lliyds have lost our business. We registered at the local GP’s surgery in Woolwell and were shocked to find that appointments were not in person but over the phone. Since then I haven’t met or even spoken to the GP with which I am registered. When I last lived in England you could find an NHS dentist certainly within a few miles or so. Now we found the nearest NHS dentists accepting new patients was in Taunton so reluctantly we decided to go private. In Guernsey you have to pay for GPs (primary care), dentists, A & E appointments and even ambulances. Once you are referred to the hospital or specialists, the States of Guernsey pick up the tab. It’s all expensive unless you have health insurance (which is also costly but is often provided as a perk in the finance industry and by some other employers). The upside is you can usually be seen at a time of your choice and on the same day. There are also no queues of ambulances outside the hospital. We downloaded our NHS apps but the next problem was having had our first two Covid jabs in Guernsey they woudn’t show up on the app. We had to make an appointment to take the Guernsey certificates and our photo Id’s to have them put on. The first ones that showed up were in Bromsgrove and Nottingham but eventually after weeks of logging back on to the app we were offered appointments near Exeter. The level of Council Tax came as a shock. The island equivalent Parish Rates cost less for a year than Council Tax here does for a month. One thing that is the same both here and in Guernsey has been the staff shortages since Brexit which has caused many businesses to shorten their hours. The nationality of workers in hospitality and healthcare has also changed with fewer Poles, Romanians and Latvians and more Philippinos and Indians.

The biggest bureaucratic nightmare has been exchanging my Guernsey driving licence for a UK one. I filed the applicationto the DVLA on October 27 last year and declared a couple of medical conditions. I then waited, and waited and waited.

Eventually after several phone calls which kept me in a queue listening to the same short distorted clip of classical music for up to 45 minutes I was told that they had written to the GP in Woolwell on February 26 requesting a medical letter but they were still waiting. This was followed by a confirmation telling me that my licence couldn’t be processed until they had heard from him. I continued to call the surgery several times to chase it up. Although I have been able to drive my car to and from work, I have not been allowed to drive on company business so it’s affecting my work. If they don’t get it processed, eventually I won’t be allowed to drive at all.

I finally received a call from the Practice Manager apologising for all the delays and telling me the doctors letter had been sent up to the DVLA on May 11, although he couldn’t tell me what it says. The ball is now back in the DVLA’s court after seven months and counting…