Our island has to look at the opportunities that are out there, said businessman Stephen Bradley who is also chairman of the island’s business agency.

Speaking during the recent Business News roundtable he said: ’A lot of businesses in the island have survived the last 12 months and we have now got to adapt to survive. And we have to look at how to thrive.

’Change is the opportunity and not the threat.

’I don’t think that as an island we have always been ’’whichever way you throw us we stand’’.

’We are not going to influence that change. We have to look at what it is and see our opportunities within that.

’And I think it is about looking at new sectors.

’It is about genuinely living up to our rhetoric, that we have to be fleet of foot and become a land of opportunity rather than worrying about it.’

Asked what are the opportunities he said in his opinion they come under regulatory opportunities, of looking at the flux that the rest of the world is in and looking at areas where we could create regulatory opportunities.

’They may not be as big as some of the finance sector guys over the last 25 years and they certainly won’t last as long but I think the example we would probably use, where the agency has worked hard, is on the cannabis regulations.

’This is where we can see confusion and mess in the UK and some of the bigger jurisdictions and identify specific opportunities where, with a smaller administrative set-up, we can be more responsive.

’We’ve got a great track record in regulation and supervision with shipping, with e-gaming and I see that opportunity in other areas.’

Lawrie Hooper, MHK, said the island had always wanted ’boots on the ground’ with people living and working here and paying tax and it was about people as opposed to the organisations here.

remote working

He said: ’Maybe with a move now towards more virtual and remote working there is a space to say that the Isle of Man is actually a great place to live, so if you work for a company that is a UK company perhaps, but you live in the Isle of Man, and spend your money and time here, and you bring your family here, maybe that is another tick in the box for us.’

He said the connectivity was still there for air routes particularly in case there was a need for physical face-to-face meetings across.

’But really why would you live in a tiny little flat in central London and pay exorbitant travel costs when you can live over here, have a small garden, have a bit of space, why would you not do that?’

And he argued that companies did not need to think about renting business space and should just think of having staff here in the island.

He said ’out of the box ideas’ had to be encouraged.

’The world is changing and we sometimes have to be ahead of that.’

Caren Pegg said in the British Virgin Islands and Bermuda the concept of ’digital nomads’ was being promoted to encourage people to settle there.

Workers were based in a jurisdiction that was not where the company they worked for was based.

She said it was an interesting idea and certainly one the island should be looking at.

Tax expert Mr Hotchkiss said: ’I agree there is a great opportunity and already many countries are jumping on this opportunity. If we take it then we need to be quick but you have to bear in mind that virtually every other country is going to be trying to stop people from doing just that.’

wealth taxes

He added there was also global focus on wealth taxes at the moment and he warned that such taxes might also include exit taxes as well.

He commented: ’If you leave places such as South Africa and Canada they already tax you on the value of assets held as you leave the country.’

’And so while I believe the idea of attracting people to come and live and work here is a great one, and we definitely have much to offer to these people as a jurisdiction, we have to be very careful about seeing how the laws in our targeted countries develop.

’The very people we are trying to attract could be discouraged from moving by the threat of penal tax charges as they leave a county or even remaining within a country’s tax net as non-residents (eg the much discussed UK wealth tax is proposed to still apply to non-residents who were UK residents for four out of the past seven tax years).’

Tim Groves of Black Grace Cowley said it was vital to be ahead of the curve.

’In my opinion we need the businesses to be here, for the businesses to take the buildings, to occupy the town centres and to generate the spend in those locations.

’It makes an economy and we have to act quickly to strike the balance.

’This pandemic is costing the governments an astronomical amount of money across the world and it all has to be paid for.

’Interest rates are low, equity markets seem to be able to support things and companies can borrow money quite readily on the corporate markets but taxes are going to have to rise this year and over the coming years in multiple jurisdictions to pay for all of this.

’As an island we have to take advantage of this and within the property sector the built environment is part.

’We have to help facilitate these moves ahead to take advatntage of opportunities.

Paul Hotchkiss said he could not agree more with Mr Groves. He said it was about building a suite of incentives for these people to come and it should include giveaways.

’We have to get on and push it’ said Mr Hotchkiss.

The capability of the island to come out of lockdown was a ’saleable commodity right now and we should be on it’ and creating a ’can do’ culture.

He added that it was also important to have a plan over the details of opening up the borders to facilitate this.