February's retail sales figures showed that the global economic recession has truly hit Bermuda, as the volume of sales (the amount of sales after inflation has been taken out) plunged by 11 percent compared to 2008.

This newspaper remains somewhat sceptical of the true accuracy of the Retail Sales Index, but it is reliable as a broad indicator of sales trends, and unlike January, when the volume of sales also fell year over year, the only sales to rise in February was food, where, it is worth noting, prices continue to rise faster than the overall rate of inflation. As Kristy Grayston, head of the Chamber of Commerce's retail sales division said, this is primarily about confidence.

"… For some people, nothing has changed, but they feel they should be tightening their belts. People have to feel confident that their jobs are safe and they don't have that confidence right now."

Indeed not. Worse, it is clear that the Island has yet to feel the worst of the recession, with the construction projects in Hamilton still fuelling the domestic economy. But many of those projects will begin to come to an end through the summer, and aside from Housing Minister David Burch's housing projects, there is little work planned to take up the slack.

That is likely to mean a sharp contraction in the construction sector, which in turn will ripple through the rest of the economy.

At the same time, the tourism sector, despite added cruise ship visitors and the opening of the Tucker's Point Hotel, looks likely to have a bad year due to a combination of the poor overseas demand, the "AIG effect" on businesses holding conferences and meetings at all, let alone outside of the US, and the disarray in Bermuda's own Tourism Ministry.

Only the insurance sector seems to be holding its own, but it is unlikely that it will be hiring in any great numbers. In the meantime, the investment fund sector is still struggling and this is carrying through to service providers like fund administrators and accounting firms, while the spectre of a crackdown on tax havens will continue to dampen new business formations on the Island.

So it is indeed a gloomy picture, at least in the short term. Because Bermuda is likely to experience the worst of the recession later than most of the rest of the world, it is tempting to think that it will also come out of it more quickly, but that seems unlikely, not least because of the continued weakness of tourism and the weakened state of Government finances.

It is no surprise then that there seems to have been an added drive for gambling to be allowed in the hotels, but after the rebuff on cruise ship gambling in port, this seems less likely than ever.

The past two periods of economic weakness ended when US catastrophes — Hurricane Andrew in 1992 and the September 11 attacks in 2001 — spurred growth in the insurance sector. But Bermuda cannot and should not rely on freak events, either man-made or natural — to pull the Island out of this recession, not only because there is no saying it will happen, but because Bermuda has lost a good deal of its lustre as a financial centre due to the actions of its own and foreign governments.

And tourism cannot rely on new developments, apparently subsidised one way or another by the taxpayer, when the need for new plant and infrastructure is only one part of the solution. Until Bermuda deals with the cost of a vacation in Bermuda and gives value for money, any "platinum period" in tourism will have a distinctly tinny feel.

At times like these, the normal expectation is for Government to take the lead. But this is not happening.

The Premier seems able only to hold "crisis" meetings and summits that result in no concrete decisions — apart from the long overdue decision to bring back the tourism road shows previously abandoned by this same Government — and to talk about how Bermudians' "creativity" will get the Island through. Platitudes are simply not enough.