These were all cock-ups under the tories. Run down public services, sell them off, make loadsamoney.
Post office is particularly tragic. It used to be one of the most prominent buildings and well used service in towns and villages throughout UK, bigger than banks, supermarkets etc. Now it's shrunk to a little counter at the back of a discount store, with a bad tempered assistant. The management have paid themselves huge amounts in bonuses whilst screwing the workforce to the point of suicide and running a diminished and inefficient service. Tory policy in a nutshell.
I do. It's the ideological dogma-driven tories who don't. Maybe you don't read the Telegraph or the Mail?
I agree.
I think the fundamental point about Public Services either being Publicly Owned or Privately Owned is about something slightly different.
Nobody has ever, EVER said that Public Services would be run "better" in Public Ownership. However, the move to Private ownership was always about making things "more efficient, better and cheaper" because "market forces" and "competition within the market place" blah blah ideological nonsense.
The thing is that WE - ie the Nation -
should not turn our Critical National Infrastructure over to Private Ownership because then it will simply be used to generate profit and to hang with the
effectiveness of the Service and keep the prices up to feed the generation of profit. Profit above everything else. I could see that clearly as a teenager and I have no idea why nobody else cannot see it as clearly:
Private Ownership:
can run the service up to a level "A", make customers pay "£x", and extract "£y" in profit. (I won't even go into the likelihood of tax being avoided on that "£y" profit)
- £x minus £y = £z is how much is spent on running the service
Public Ownership:
Can
easily be configured to run the service up to the same level "A" and at a cost of "£z", therefore saving the Public "£y" overall due to no requirement to extract profit from the cycle.
- Even if there's flab in the system due to the raving righty screaming that Publicly Run Services are always inefficient - it can still go overbudget by "£y" and still be no worse off fro the consumer - ie the Public.
I refute that Public Ownership always implies inefficiency - just peek over the fence at France, Germany - both State owned railways, for instance - both models of efficient, effective and inexpensive transport networks (and which are being subsidised by UK taxpayers).
Critical National Infrastructure does not belong in the hands of Private Ownership. That may sound like an ideology - but it isn't really - it's a necessity to support the Economy in which a Capitalist industrial complex can thrive. Everything is interconnected. Transport is a fundamental requirement for a mobile work force. Health is required for a fit and healthy work force. Etc...
