If ministerial talks fail today, it is likely that the sister islands will face each other in front of the Commonwealth’s highest court early next year.
The dispute is over the Sarnians’ decision to ban Jersey fishermen from their territorial waters.
The Jersey Fishermen’s Association (JFA) successfully overturned that decision in Guernsey’s Royal Court, but last year Guernsey appealed to the Channel Islands Court of Appeal and won the right to reinstate the ban.
Since then the bitter dispute has undermined attempts to get the two islands’ governments to work together.
And those attempts at joint working could be all but wrecked if the two sides have to fight it out in front of the Privy Council after the JFA decided to take the case to the highest court possible – hence today’s talks in Guernsey between Economic Development Minister Philip Ozouf and his Guernsey counterpart, Deputy Stuart Falla.
