Our water supply should be re-nationalised – and soon!
Friday, 7th March
q ANNOUNCEMENTS of a change in services to the public are invariably characterised as being improvements which will benefit us all.
But within a very short time they reveal themselves to be nothing of the kind.
The privatisation of water is a case in point, underpinned as it was by a spurious argument about how competition always brings prices down and puts efficiency up.
Our old water board, the Metropolitan Water Board, was set up in the early 20th century and oversaw the massive expansion of London’s water supply with new reservoirs and water treatment centres.
Then it became Thames Water Authority and continued efficiently until ideologue politicians decided in 1989 that privatisation would give a better public service.
Since then the flow of cash has been more impressive than the flow of water as we saw much of Metropolitan’s infrastructure flogged off as real estate.
It’s far from clear where that flow of cash has ended up, but the price of getting water in our taps has rocketed, much of it to pay for massive debts racked up by the ideologically sound but often ineffective private company we now have to rely on.
Surely the new government must press ahead with re-nationalising our water.
The longer they leave it the longer we are captive customers of a dud company.
G DUNN, WC1
