B.A.Ware

I personally think the utilities should be re-nationalised and run like any other private industry the government should employ the top people in these industries and pay them the going rates with bonuses if they return a profit. At least this profit would return back in to the public coffers, which could then be used to invest in these industries. If the government cannot take on the responsibilities to run these industries then how can we trust them to run a country (oh I forgot there handing that responsibility over to Europe)

mkpdavies

I expect Julian will be along shortly.

My personal opinion is that some things need some government involvement, as they will never be profit making, thus no private business will every make a good job of it. Running prisions for instance. Other industries seem to run fine/better without government invlovement, for example the telelphone industry.

Thus I can't say yes or no as I am split depending on what industry or service you are talking about.

Julian I expect will have a good case why nothing should be run by the government, so I'd wait for his reply.

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Julian Morrison

And voila, I appear!

Hell no.

- It's theft. Not yours. Hands off.

- Capitalism isn't suspended, just the roles shuffled around. Nationalized industry sees government as the customer and you, the humble buyer/voter, as the product. So naturally, it treats you like dirt. Who cares if the product's happy?

- In fact, for solid reasons relating to the inability to prioritize public needs without market prices, or detect opportunities and while elephants without the ability to compute profit and loss, nationalized industry cannot help but suck even if run with the best will in the world.

- Why are even having this conversation? Surely you socialists should have learned by repeated, dismal, economy-grinding example, even if you can't grasp the theory.

Anthony Butcher

If things work better in a nationalised form, then go for it. It should purely be based on what provides the best service and best value for money. The free market approach to everything has been thoroughly discredited by the failure of the railways, water, power etc to provide either better value for money or better services.

That doesn't mean that the free market theory is wrong, just that the British government is incapable of implementing it properly.

UKIP MAN

Water

Gas

Electricity

everything else you should have choice!!!!!

B.A.Ware

[quote="Julian Morrison"]And voila, I appear!

It was public money that built up the utilities like Gas, Electricity and Water; you cannot steal something that was robbed off you in the first place.



The government are the board the voters are the shareholders and the customers. If the shareholders are not happy they can ultimately change the board.

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If some of the top businessmen in the country were employed to run these company’s with say a million pound bonus, I can assure you if their jobs were on the line, the service would be there so would the product and so would the profit

One I am not a socialist I believe in the free market. But monopolies that were financed by the public purse should now return the profit back the to people

Julian Morrison

The train privatization was a botch, largely because the Tories couldn't stand to let go control, they wanted business run "for the public good", and they wanted it not to startle the voters with any sudden changes. What they created is more like for-profit outsourcing, rather than full privatization. So it doesn't discredit anything except Tory economic savvy.

Julian Morrison

Which was itself stolen via tax. That is certainly an argument you can't win on those terms!

It should have been returned to the public by giving everyone free shares. That I'd agree with. But done is done and now it's privately owned the current owner has the strongest claim. So it certainly would be stealing to re-nationalize!

B.A.Ware

Well I’m going to have a go. Tax is there for the benefit for all of us, we might not like it but that’s the way it is we can try and change it in the future but until then we have to live with it. If an injustice is done however long ago should we just forget it? I don’t advocate taking them back INTO phpbb_the public sector with no recompense. I would buy them back over staged periods, maybe over years; surely some of the money saved from Europe could be used for this.

C_steam

I would make the judgement on:

• value to the consumer in terms of service and product quality
  Effect on the nation in terms of resource risk and control in time of trouble
  Number of potential players in the ring - i.e. the effect of competition - is it possible?.

Those that would be nationalised would need to be very public in their accounting, reporting and accountability to 'shareholders' - to the same standard as a large multi national.

For me, I would:-

• maintain and support the post office.
  Nationalise the generating industry in tandem with a long term energy policy
  maintain current situation in telecomms
  Consider privitisation of hospitals
  Consider how to handle the railways - almost certainly bringing the infrastructure under 'proper' national control.