Should the UK take back control of water? The growing calls to renationalise utilities

National World - LocalTV

Fraom soaring bills to sewage spills - criticism of UK privatised utilities is at an all time high. With public frustration growing , could public ownership be the solution?

Transcript

00:00When we talk about privatisation of public utilities, we go back to the days of a certain

00:06Margaret Thatcher who believed passionately, I have to say, that public utilities and public

00:12services, they were somehow flabby and bureaucratic, and the public were not getting the value

00:19that she thought they deserved, and privatisation was the way to do it.

00:23Of course, what we've seen is many of these organisations which have failed, I guess the

00:30most egregious example, if you like, was the British Rail, which of course has never really

00:36functioned properly, and of course parts of the rail system have been put back into public

00:42hands.

00:43Of course, the difficulty is that when you privatise, you sell off bits to the public,

00:47and indeed I'm old enough to remember when we were offered the chance to buy shares in

00:51these companies, but of course these shares got hoovered up, or vacuumed up, if I may

00:56use the word, by large equity investors, and of course they see some value in getting

01:04these organisations.

01:06Public frustration with water companies largely stems from repeated failures to invest adequately

01:13in infrastructure.

01:14Over the last decade, profits often went to shareholders rather than upgrading ageing

01:20systems.

01:21This has directly contributed to increased pollution incidents, including untreated sewage

01:27spills affecting rivers, beaches and local wildlife habitats.

01:32But water is an essential part of it, we have to have it to live.

01:37But the water companies have been asset stripped, if you like, and indeed in Thames example,

01:42to amass a three billion pound debt is absolutely phenomenal.

01:47This money has gone somewhere, and as I say, the investors, they've taken dividends, but

01:52at the same time not put the money into improving the system.

01:57The fact that so many of the water companies are in difficulty suggests that there is something

02:01fundamentally wrong, I also believe the regulator has to step up and take responsibility for

02:06this, whereby money that's been paid in, and indeed I challenge anyone to look at their

02:11water bill and look at what's happened in recent years, they've gone up and up and up,

02:15which of course was not what was promised by the Conservative government of the 1980s

02:21by and large under Sir Thatcher, we would get better value services for lower cost.

02:25That's not what's happening and people are having to pay more for a less good service.

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