Should the energy industry be renationalised?

Southend1

matelodave wrote: »

I'd take issue with Archbishop - I worked for a company that supplied & installed equipment for the GPO and BT and throughout that time probably visited more 200 telephone exchanges & repeaters stations throughout the UK and was astonished at the waste. Over manning and over specification of equipment & services that went on during the GPO era. The staff were paid between two & three times more than any of us in the supplier sector.

It slowly started to improve when they were privatised but it wasn't until the likes of Mercury and other competition came along did we all (both customer and suppliers) see benefits of better technology, more choice and lower prices.

Overmanning was a joke, most exchanges had 2-3 time more people in then than were needed, many of them were running TV & radio repair shops in the exchanges. Equipment was overspecified and over ordered and the engineers stifled innovation and the introduction of new services.

If BT was still the nationalised GPO we'd all still have black phones with rotary dials on them and they'd all be nipping off on strike if someone upset them.

I do actually have an old BT rotary dial phone. It's red. I guess 1970s vintage? It still works fine. I have had countless Chinese made digital cordless phones broken and replaced and yet the old fashioned phone still works fine! If it ain't broke, no need to sling it out.

Southend1

YouGov poll out today shows majority in favour of nationalisation: http://yougov.co.uk/news/2013/11/04/nationalise-energy-and-rail-companies-say-public/

anon_ymous

Imo, governments always manage to screw things up when it comes to industries. I wasn't born in an era where every thing was publicly owned, so I can't really comment on the differences within the UK,

HOWEVER I have family in Pakistan, and the prices they pay for a nationalised grid, is around 10p/kWh. That doesn't sound like much, but then bear in mind that Pakistan is right next to Iran and pretty close to the oil rich nations, and lots of it's own reserves as well, so electricity SHOULD be a lot cheaper

And the electricity just cuts off at certain times. If private companies got involved, they'd know that people will vote with their feet.

With government, you can vote for a new gov't, but those inefficiencies will still exist

anon_ymous

spot1034 wrote: »

That's because the people who want it have no coherent argument - they just have theis vague idea that it would somehow mean lower bills. In fact, it wouldn't - if anything they would probably be higher.

This. Imo, currently nationalised economies don't really offer value for money at all

anon_ymous

tori.k wrote: »

I doubt that our bill's would be any cheaper under nationalisation since the biggest slice of the pie already goes to the Government in there tax's.
Domestic Water supply on the other hand should never of been sold when there was never a chance for fair competition.

This is true. I'd like for other water companies to be able to compete with what we already have. Before I went to uni, I genuinely thought I could have a Yorkshire water supply in the midlands (It's cheap! ). I know you could say the clues in the name, but then you can get Scottish power, in the midlands as well

I was a tad annoyed when the ONLY company we could use are Severn Trent. Tbf, they do seem to be one of the cheaper companies out there

C_Mababejive

The idea proposed by the OP is a complete non starter. It cannot and will not happen. Energy prices are fair.

MillicentBystander

If the internet existed 100 years ago there would have course been posters stating the vote for women wasn't ever going to happen and the current voting system was fair...;)

Archbishop

Irrespective of gov taxes etc...take out the feeds to shareholders and the FAT cats and logically it would lead to either cheaper prices or improved service...simples...unless you are one of the brainwashed few who work for them or an opportunist capitalist Tory.