Treasury Minister Alfred Cannan has talked for the first time about how it had been ’incredibly intense’ as decisions were made by the government during the pandemic.

He said: ’It certainly wasn’t in the job description.’

Asked by the Topical Talks group about what it was like during the pandemic for himself and other senior government ministers he said: ’There was huge pressure.’

Stressing he was talking about the business aspects of the crisis he said in the early days of the pandemic the overnight collapse of Flybe signalled ’that this was going to have an incredible effect across the island. It just became four or five weeks of the most intense scrutiny but also of trying to deal with literally hundreds of people in businesses that wanted answers.

’I think, looking back, we got through it pretty well. You learn a huge amount about yourself and an awful lot about what you need to do to stay calm but to work at speed and pace bringing people together.

’There was so much that was going on at the time and recognising that we were also going down some dark alleys. It was so hugely, hugely intense right through to us rolling things out. There were lots of people in different situations. There were businesses that had three or four days of cash in the bank, businesses that had three or four months in the bank, but nevertheless particularly for small businesses, these were critical days for them. They were facing a lot of pressure.’

Greg Ellison, chief executive of Capital International, said to Mr Cannan: ’I think you all did a great job. There is no rule book, no handbook over this.

’The scrutiny that you were under . . . I suppose if you are a UK politician then you expect it. But for an Isle of Man local politician, you don’t really.

’I thought you all did a good job.’

Mike Foy, chief executive of the Utmost Group in the island, said the government was right to take some early brave decisions that included cancelling the TT.

The roundtable group agreed the government’s actions were to be applauded.

Mr Cannan said the two ’flagship’ schemes, the salary support scheme and the MERA, ’both did their job. And they were rolled out pretty quickly and efficiently’. There were thousands of applications and they were dealt with ’in a relatively quick time’.

Mike Foy pointed out the borders situation and the fact we are still at level four. He asked what the feeling was in government over the economic impact of no travel into the island and the ’general health of Isle of Man plc.’

Mr Cannan accepted the border situation was a tension point along with ’reasonable access to families’ and management of bigger travel issues such as students travelling home for holidays.

’We have to make progress but actually let’s be clear. There will not be a magic solution before spring and then we will have to make further decisions depending on what the international situation is.

’I don’t think we should shy away from having a good public debate but as it stands at the moment, given that we have hit September, can we afford to regress again into a position of locking down?

’These questions are critical and it is important for people’s health and the potential for people to get seriously ill from this disease.

’So I’m absolutely supportive of small steps.’

Mr Cannan said the global situation was manifesting itself in the accommodation sector, some parts of manufacturing such as the aviation sector, and potentially the petrochemicals sector.’