A national newspaper has claimed “ungrateful locals on Guernsey” prefer French tourists to British ones.
After the island enjoyed a successful summer season, with the number of visitors from the continent up on recent years, the Daily Mail has painted the island negatively in an article published on Sunday.
It came little more than 24 hours after the same newspaper published a glowing review of the island on Saturday advising its readers “where to eat, stay, and play”.
Saturday’s article highlighted Guernsey’s “café culture” in St Peter Port, with Dix Neuf named as a place to try, while ‘the Rocky’ was given a shout-out under the sub-heading “Beside the seaside”.
The Peninsula and the Imperial were both recommended as places to stay, in Lifestyle and Digital Editor Sophie Hines’ write up, while she also praised La Vallette bathing pools, Castle Cornet, Fort Grey, the German Occupation Museum, and Petit Bot bay and tea room as places to visit.
Hines describes Guernsey as being “full of charming beaches”.
Meanwhile a separate news report published on Sunday branded the “tiny island” as “ungrateful” to British holidaymakers, suggesting islanders “feel” that “the French are far superior visitors than the Brits because they are interested in their culture, more polite and ready to spend”.
The report claimed: “Business owners on the Channel Island are gushing about excited tourists flocking to their shores, buying drinks, lunches, spending money in their souvenir shops and sunbathing on their beaches.
“However, despite the tiny island being a crown dependency, and residents largely speaking English, its not crowds of British holidaymakers they can’t get enough of.
“In fact, some have even gone as far to call our tourists ‘disrespectful’.”
It did, however, accurately note that Guernsey had been reflecting on “a successful summer packed with holidaymakers”.
Following the introduction of the new Brittany Ferries service, there was an increase in the number of people travelling to and from Guernsey this year, compared to 2024 and previously.
Just six months after it took over the contract, Brittany Ferries said it had carried almost a third more passengers between Guernsey, the UK, and France this year, than travelled during the same period a year ago.
Based on passenger numbers for April to August, Brittany Ferries said an additional 38,522 people travelled on a sailing this year – up 29% on 2024, when Condor Ferries was running the services as part of its contract including stops in Jersey.
Digging into the data a bit more, it was said that between April and June 2025, an additional 5,000 French people had travelled to Guernsey compared to the same period last year. Further, by the end of June, more than 12,000 visitors had made their way to Guernsey from France in total this year.
However, the increased number of French visitors hasn’t changed the fact that the majority of visitors to Guernsey are from the UK.
Regardless of where they come from, an increase in visitor numbers is of course good news for Guernsey, its tourism and hospitality sectors and the wider economy.
The people quoted in the Daily Mail article referenced how busy St Peter Port had been over summer, with one saying she had seen “a mix of French families, young people and elderly and they’re all so respectable, polite and interested in the island”.
Those quoted said that French visitors “spend more money than the British”, and are “way more friendly than the Brits”, while one restaurant worker said they tip better too.