Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 10:01 am  

Mintball wrote:

To add, if I remember correctly, water was sold off at a knock-down price to start with, in recognition of the fact that much needed doing on the infrastructure, so that excuse won't wash (so to speak).

The government spent over £20,000,000 to advertise the water privatisation over a 3 month period. That is a massive amount in any budget for 3 months nearly 23 years ago. but similar in budget to the electricity one and there was one other that escapes me. It might have been the railways, but I really can't recall.

They spent £20m of taxpayers' money to sell off something the taxpayer didn't want selling off in the first place.

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 10:07 am  

Rooster Booster wrote:

The government spent over £20,000,000 to advertise the water privatisation over a 3 month period. That is a massive amount in any budget for 3 months nearly 23 years ago. but similar in budget to the electricity one and there was one other that escapes me. It might have been the railways, but I really can't recall.

They spent £20m of taxpayers' money to sell off something the taxpayer didn't want selling off in the first place.

The cost of ideology, eh?

It's rather amusing, in a dry sort of fashion, reading the forums at the Telegraph of late, where there are increasing numbers of contributors posting things such as: 'I never thought I'd say so, but we should never have privatised X, Y and Z.'

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 10:22 am  

Scooter Nik wrote:

Twart.

Good word.


I shall bear in mind the Guinea Pigs, we have one lurking behind the door as I type.

I know, i have the live video feed from Chief Pig HQ

Scooter Nik wrote:

And thanks for the advice on the Foe bin, off to use it now. Not as much as I could, I need Robinson and Dally for my daily hate.

Oh, you wouldn't bin off anyone like that. Just the very rarest of beasts with not even a molecule of point to their existence, where on reading their posts, the answer to the question, "Do I begrudge the wear and tear on my optic nerves for having to transmit this to my brain" is a clear "Yes". I give you Captain Capslock, for example.

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 10:28 am  

Mintball wrote:

The cost of ideology, eh?

It's rather amusing, in a dry sort of fashion, reading the forums at the Telegraph of late, where there are increasing numbers of contributors posting things such as: 'I never thought I'd say so, but we should never have privatised X, Y and Z.'

With a water board that we all own, we rightly accept that we really are all in it together when there's a water shortage.

But, in the same drought, having to pay a water bill to a profit-making company that doesn't actually supply you with any water is completely different.

[DaveO]

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 10:54 am  

BrisbaneRhino wrote:

Increased capital spend leads to higher prices - otherwise the investment simply won't happen. Delaying necessary investment simply leads to a more significant price shock further down the track. Would you rather a 30% increase in three years time than 8% today (together with deteriorating services in the meantime)? That tends to be what happens when you delay investment in asset-intensive industries.

What no one can ever adequately explain to me is given we pay for this capital investment with higher prices anyway is why those prices would not be lower if a profit was not being taken.

If people really do believe privatised companies are more efficient than nationalised ones why not run them along the exact same lines but minus the shareholders and use the profit to keep the prices down?

The idea we need these companies as they are because our pensions invest in them is a no reason for privatisation either. Our pension funds would simply invest in something else.

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 10:56 am  

DaveO wrote:

What no one can ever adequately explain to me is given we pay for this capital investment with higher prices anyway is why those prices would not be lower if a profit was not being taken.

If people really do believe privatised companies are more efficient than nationalised ones why not run them along the exact same lines but minus the shareholders and use the profit to keep the prices down?

The idea we need these companies as they are because our pensions invest in them is a no reason for privatisation either. Our pension funds would simply invest in something else.

And indeed, in the case of the train companies, the government (so us, in effect) pays for new rolling stock for the private rail companies – and then pays the private rail companies a subsidy to run it.

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 12:27 pm  

Mintball wrote:

And indeed, in the case of the train companies, the government (so us, in effect) pays for new rolling stock for the private rail companies – and then pays the private rail companies a subsidy to run it.

Or, how about one of Branson's greatest wheezes?
He persuaded the fat controller that the West Coast line needed to be upgraded for his new trains to run on it.
This was agreed and we (yes we) paid for it to be upgraded.
But the upgrade caused disruption and ... you've guessed it ... Virgin were compensated for the consequent delays to their trains.
All the while receiving eye-watering subsidies to run the trains in the first place.

East Coast trains (used to be National Express and before that was GNER) is nowadays owned by the Dept of Transport.
And it's around 50 quid cheaper to go from Leeds to London (open return) via publicly-owned East Coast than it is from Manchester to London via the efficient and privatised West Coast mainline.

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 12:39 pm  

Now remind me again why privatisation was such a great idea?

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 12:42 pm  

DaveO wrote:

What no one can ever adequately explain to me is given we pay for this capital investment with higher prices anyway is why those prices would not be lower if a profit was not being taken.

If people really do believe privatised companies are more efficient than nationalised ones why not run them along the exact same lines but minus the shareholders and use the profit to keep the prices down?

"Efficiency" is one of those vague words that are often thrown into debate to mislead. People have strived to make the best use of their time since the dawn of man. Indeed, you could argue that it is one of the reasons human beings as a species have been so successful. That said, the modern Cult of Efficiency (which arose around the turn of the last century with the introduction of huge assembly lines and megafactories) is something more than a simple equation of economics. It's ideological and defined by its own peculiar set of metrics which should be understood more by what is left out of the equation than vice versa. So, a police department can be said to be more "efficient" by cutting 20% of its workforce. But the equation says nothing about the costs that are now transferred over to the public.

It's the same with buses. The first thing a company does after privatisation is cut loss-making routes. The metrics say it is now more "efficient" whilst staying completely silent over people left stuck in a dangerous city past 11:00pm.

Re: Double standards : Wed Feb 01, 2012 12:56 pm  

Accepting all the points made above about privatisation. Might I offer an explaination as to why prices have gone up so much.

The processing of clean, potable water requires a phenomenal quantity of energy. IIRC Thames Water are the largest consumer of electricity in the Thames Valley and given the large increases in wholesale energy prices, an increase in water bills when the 5 year deal was renegotiated was inevitable. I know for a fact that water companies invest substantially in reducing their energy consumption and this in some respect is offsetting the increase compared to that for electrical power.

We could get started on the privatisation of the power industry now...