| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? 11:44 - Aug 15 with 3516 views | Ryorry |
Apart from lining their execs' & shareholders' profits, obvs.
Can't find the specific link from about 2 days ago highlighting that dozens of disabled and chronically ill 80-90 year old residents of blocks of flats in E. London have been left without running water for 5+ days, with Thames Water's response being to dump 6l of bottles per person per day in the groundfloor entrances, but these give some general background as to problems in the area -
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/art
https://www.theguardian.com/uk
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| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 17:13 - Aug 16 with 501 views | SuperKieranMcKenna |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 17:11 - Aug 16 by Ryorry |
He literally said “Other supermarkets available. No one forced to shop at Britmart.”!
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Everyone would be forced to pay for it though 😀 |  | | |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 18:00 - Aug 16 with 442 views | Churchman |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 15:18 - Aug 16 by SuperKieranMcKenna |
Well worryingly, it hasn’t made £10bn of profit, Thames Water is barely liquid (No pun intended). They are riddled in a net debt of around £20bn. In effect they have raised debt to fund dividends, I certainly wouldn’t touch them as investment, it’s all going to end in tears. If it was run by the state, we’d likely not have seen more investment since that ‘profit’ is actually just debt (see how nationalisation hasn’t magically reduced train fares).
Not that I agree with the privatisation of a monopoly, I just think people have unrealistic expectations around nationalisation, given the national debt and fiscal gap, they’d almost certainly be underfunded. |
Sorry SKM, there is no ‘effectively’ when it comes to raising debt to pay dividends. It’s precisely what these people did. And to be honest, why not? If I live far distant, I want the assets milked, stripped, rinsed. Downside to the mugs paying? Really not my problem. It’s a simple dynamic.
To turn this around for those who think it’s fine, I’ve no problem with capitalism (it’s how the world works), the private sector, competition or anything like it.
But if for things like basics (water, energy etc), you must control it properly. If you don’t, welcome to U.K. today. It’s really not a difficult concept or choice - provided you are not tied in and personally benefitting from it in the way so many politicians did in the 80/s/90s and Trump probably does now in totalitarian America.
It’s how I see it. |  | | |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 18:16 - Aug 16 with 413 views | Radlett_blue |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 12:04 - Aug 16 by Ryorry |
There is zero way private companies were/are better if you live in a rural area.
Until now, RM have been the ONLY reliable couriers here.
Unknown to me, local hospital sent me a test result letter marked ‘Private and Confidential’ + follow-up sample pot in mid-March, via courier company. Found 3 months later by my neighbour searching for her missing Evri parcel, in a disused salt bin on the public road 200m from my house. |
Royal Mail has been perpetually loss-making since letter volume collapsed as a result of the internet, while they still have to deliver to expensive, remote locations. This is very similar to the US Postal Service. Royal Mail is owned by Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky. Unsurprisingly, the service has become worse. Private companies cherry pick the growing & profitable parcel business. |  |
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| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 18:39 - Aug 16 with 377 views | DJR |
Getting 96 bottles of water when our water supply by South East Water was cut off for a day or so a couple of weeks ago?
It then went the day after it was fixed but only for a few hours.
Fortunately, there was still water in our butt for flushing the toilets using a watering can without the filter cap.
And we still have about 80 bottles left. [Post edited 16 Aug 18:49]
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| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 21:42 - Aug 16 with 294 views | BanksterDebtSlave |
You have to laugh or else you'd cry!
Incentivised to create shortages, it's the football tourist model isn't it? |  |
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| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 00:45 - Aug 17 with 233 views | BlueForYou |
Were’t Anglian Water trying to build two new reservoirs? One in Cambridgeshire & one in Lincolnshire..?? |  | | |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 06:59 - Aug 17 with 181 views | WestStanderLaLaLa |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 11:23 - Aug 16 by mutters |
Telecommunication is the only one that I believe privatisation has had a big positive impact.
Some benefits -
- Falling Prices
- Massive Investment into Tech
- Mobile/Broadband revolution
- Wide range of choice of providers |
We could have had fibre much earlier with Ipswich at the forefront of the roll out until Thatcher stopped it
https://www.techradar.com/news
https://www.techmonitor.ai/tec
https://tribunemag.co.uk/2022/ |  |
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| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 07:53 - Aug 17 with 139 views | OldFart71 |
The bit that annoys me most whichever utility it is is that they all have so called watchdogs, Offwat, Offcom etc. These are a complete and utter waste of time and money. They allow these companies to flaunt their responsibility and then allow them to charge the consumer for doing the things they should have done.
When they do fine these companies for spills or pollution (as with the water companies) this money should be then allocated to upgrading the system. | | | |
| The 'benefits' of utilities' privatisation - can anyone think of any? on 08:21 - Aug 17 with 113 views | DJR |
Forward planning and expertise were at the heart of the nationalised industries.
Take electricity, where the UK had the first civil nuclear programme in the world.
As it is, huge pension surpluses were used to give early retirement (some as young as 50) to vast numbers of highly experienced staff, my dad included.
There was also a public service ethos which no longer exists.
To give a couple of examples, our house was affected by flash flooding 20 years ago, and it emerged that the reason was, with limited staff, Southern Water no longer cleared the main sewers from build-up, it being cheaper for them to clear up after an incident.
And a water leak near us around the same was left overnight because it was cheaper for South East Water to fix the next day, the result being that water entered the gas supply system and water got as far as our boiler, shutting it down and necessitating a huge water tanker at our property to pump out the water.
EDIT: when it comes to forward planning the following is damning and doubly so given climate change and an increase in population of about 12 million since privatisation.
"Last year [2024] the government announced proposals to build nine new reservoirs by 2050, but none are likely to be operational for at least 10 years.
No major reservoirs have been completed in England since 1992, shortly after the water sector was privatised. [Post edited 17 Aug 9:37]
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