There was a time when somebody wanted
to tarmac roads and the street, lights,
and thought it'd be wonderful for us.
But that's not the way that the local people think.
They've lived on the island for 450 years, manage very nicely.
We don't really need it.
The island of Sark in the English Channel
is a place where time flows slowly.
Its fewer than 500 inhabitants still
live a semi-feudal existence.
But commercial interests have forced the island
to open itself up and to move into the 21st century.
I'd heard the island was facing the risk of a power
shutdown because of a standoff between a monopolistic
electricity company and a government
that some said wasn't as democratic as it professed
to be.
So I'd come to Sark to find out what was going on.
It's a very long-standing issue.
It goes back to 1947, to just after the war,
when a guy called Malcolm Robson came along and offered
to supply the island with electricity, which is obviously
a need.
So it was then privately owned.
It was his own private investment.
And he established the company.
What then happened subsequently is
that's the arrangement that's carried on
without any regulation.
And then Sark finds itself over a barrel having two choices.
You either buy electricity off this gentleman,
or you generate your own, which was also expensive.
And so it was the lack of regulation, I think,
that's really caught us out.
But it was actually an attempt to bring in regulation that
sparked the current crisis.
Soaring price of electricity had led the government,
called Chief Pleas, to bring in price controls last year.
But Sark Electricity said the lower prices would bankrupt it,
and the company threatened to turn the power off
unless it was allowed to put prices back up.
Sark faced total blackout.
So I am in the main high street of Sark.
It's called the Avenue.
And as you can see, it is completely pitch black,
apart from someone passing.
Hello.
In a mobility chair, which you actually need a special licence
to drive because you're not even allowed
those, because that's counted as a vehicle here.
There are no street lights here and no cars.
So the only bits of light that we have
are little bits of light from the houses around us.
An eleventh-hour agreement for Chief Pleas
to buy out the electricity company
kept the power on through the winter.
But I'd heard the dispute was once again bubbling over
because no one could agree on what price
the government should pay.
What everyone could agree on was the fact
that 66 pence per kilowatt hour is a lot
to pay for electricity.
It's over five times the UK average.
Sark has to import diesel to convert into electricity,
so prices have always been high.
But how had they shot up quite so much?
We're so small, we have no way to spread the costs.
So our price is very high.
The new democratic government has spent so much time
interfering, it has cost the company
over a half a million pounds.
And that only put the price of electricity up.
Their one big demand was that we open the books to the world.
We're a private company, and I'm not
interested in letting my employees' salaries be a matter
for discussion in the pub.
The islanders are worried that the electricity crisis could
drag on into the spring and summer
months, when around 55,000 visitors will
descend onto Sark.
I wish they'd hurry up and get something sorted out
because time is marching on, and the season's
just around the corner.
And the last thing we want is for it
all to blow up again right at the beginning of the tourist
season.
Sarkese may be British citizens, but the island
has never been part of the UK, nor subject to its government.
And this has, de facto, helped Sark
remain isolated from the modern world.
People like things to change very slowly,
hence there's no motor cars on the roads and things.
It's illegal to drive a motor car on the roads.
It's legal to drive a motor car over the fields,
but not on the roads.
The island was granted the right to operate
as an independent royal fief by Queen Elizabeth in 1565
on condition that it was kept free of pirates.
But in 2008, its feudal constitution was reformed,
and Sark held its first general election.
Some islanders told me they thought
the old feudal system was fairer and
that the new, quote unquote, "democratic government"
is to blame for the electricity crisis.
What price paradise?
If you want reliable electricity,
you have to pay for it.
I think it was a fake crisis personally.
I don't think that any government
should put its population in a situation of crisis like that.
And I don't think it was a real crisis.
I think it should have been sorted out long before.
If the clash of cultures on Sark really
is one between protectionists and commercialists,
it's easy to see why the government is
refusing to back down.
They've learned from market forces
that if yours is the only bid in town
and the seller wants to sell, you dictate the price.