Reply to: Ed Miliband accused of 'socialism'

[MicrosoftBob]

Ed Miliband accused of 'socialism' as he suggests re-nationalising railways - Telegraph

How disgraceful for a Labour person to be a socialist.

Considering the jew haters he likes to keep in the party, the national socialist workers party would be more appropriate for Labour

Perhaps they'll try for a coalition with the Liberals, after all they have David Ward

[darmstadt]

Better than big state controlled industries though. In all this talk of "privatisation of the railways isn't working", every seems to have forgotten that before privatisation, British Rail was a national joke.

Many years ago there was a part of British Rail in Derby which was the one of the world's foremost rail research centres, for example, they invented computerised signalling control and this was sold successfully around the world. However, along came privatisation and Railtrack took over and decided that this was something they didn't need and got rid of all the engineers and decided to use imported kit but this didn't work. Because of this, costs of certain lines went sky high and Railtrack went bust and Network Rail came into play. They in fact did get some engineers in to manage their engineering but still went with imported equipment. The rail research division went on to become the independent firm Delta Rail and although they produce first rate equipment, Network Rail still won't buy British but insist of only foreign companies providing their equipment. For example, Delta Rail invested 12m of their own money in upgrading the current signalling kit and got it approved for Network Rail's use yet Network Rail are handing 3 overseas firms 70m to do this (Railtrack and London Underground have proven that signalling kit made abroad doesn't work spectacularly well here also.)

Network Rail has actually now been nationalised (1) and this status has been backdated to 2004 so surely as a nationalised industry it should in fact be buying British. In fact have a look at Tracksure, a really rather good British product used in many foreign railways, which London Underground estimate will save them 300,000 a year yet Network Rail have dismissed out of hand.

I sometimes think that privatisation doesn't always work, primarily because the initial consultations, offerings, etc. seem to be controlled by businesses who have a vested interest (see Royal Mail.)

Next up for privatisation is the GPSS (Government Pipeline and Storage System) which the strategic oil supply network which supplies key military bases and airports such as Heathrow and Gatwick. Lets see how that one pnas out


(1)

NETWORK RAIL will become a public sector body during the coming year, following a reclassification of the company's status by the Office for National Statistics. The present company was set up in late 2001 to take over from Railtrack, but although NR had no shareholders it was said to be in the private sector.

The change in its status will place its current debt of some £30 billion into the public accounts for the first time. Network Rail said the change was a largely technical matter and would not affect its governance, structure or investment plans.

Network Rail will be now be formally classified as a 'central government body in the public sector', and the company admitted that some 'small changes' will be inevitable. There is also now a question mark over how the organisation will raise funding for future investment in the longer term.

Another point of some dispute is whether the change represents actual nationalisation. The dictionary definition of the word is 'government ownership', but the DfT has maintained that the term is inappropriate in this case, although it has not explained why.

[VectraMan]

So exactly who would be this governing body? The goverment? Surely when they privatised the railways and other industries they did put in regulations but as the companies couldn't adhere to them, then they slowly but surely got changed and politicians got a new job after the election. That worked! Each of these industries that have been privatised does have a 'governing' body, Office of Rail Regulation, OFCOM, etc. or should the governing body also be a private company comprising of people from the industry? If so, then why don't you just privatise government and do away with the middleman?

The government, representing the electorate in theory, should be the ones responsible for the regulation. The fact that regulators have proved a bit toothless up to now doesn't mean the principle is wrong, it just means the government hasn't done a very good job on setting up the regulators. Again if the public were a bit more pro-business, there would be more public pressure on governments to get this sort of thing right, whereas at the moment people just blame privatisation, or Thatcher, or greed, as that's far easier than thinking.

[darmstadt]

Better than big state controlled industries though. In all this talk of "privatisation of the railways isn't working", every seems to have forgotten that before privatisation, British Rail was a national joke.

It should work like Formula 1. The governing body have a raft of strict regulations, and the teams do their best to compete within the regulations. Sometimes they bend the regulations and everybody starts accusing everybody else of cheating and it all gets very political, but that's part of the process.

So exactly who would be this governing body? The goverment? Surely when they privatised the railways and other industries they did put in regulations but as the companies couldn't adhere to them, then they slowly but surely got changed and politicians got a new job after the election. That worked! Each of these industries that have been privatised does have a 'governing' body, Office of Rail Regulation, OFCOM, etc. or should the governing body also be a private company comprising of people from the industry? If so, then why don't you just privatise government and do away with the middleman?

[VectraMan]

Regulation tends to have the exact opposite of the desired effect. Not always, but almost always.

Better than big state controlled industries though. In all this talk of "privatisation of the railways isn't working", every seems to have forgotten that before privatisation, British Rail was a national joke.

It should work like Formula 1. The governing body have a raft of strict regulations, and the teams do their best to compete within the regulations. Sometimes they bend the regulations and everybody starts accusing everybody else of cheating and it all gets very political, but that's part of the process.

It means, for example, teams aren't tempted to cut corners on safety to make the cars faster as the FIA takes responsibility for dictating safety rules. Just like the regulators should take responsibility to ensure the entire banking system doesn't collapse rather than trying to pin it on the banks being immoral.

The real problem is the populist idea that socialists spread of "how dare they make a profit", like somehow anyone is going to invest billions in UK infrastructure just for the good of society. If everybody would just get over it; if everybody would just accept that capitalism is the only way that works, then we can probably move on. Maybe even the NHS can be made to work.

[DodgyAgent]

As a firm capitalist, which things do you think should be run by the state out of interest DA? I assume you would agree some services don't really fit a capitalist model?

I am really lost as to how but I think anything that is a total monopoly should be at least under a different form of control than a free market business. these include the Health service, Rail, Post, Power, water . No one however seems to want to even debate it. Maybe there should be a separate tier of stock market for these organisations.

[SpontaneousOrder]

I think lots of services should be effectively regulated by Government. Not sure there isn't a place for privatising many services in part or whole but we should ride them hard!

Regulation tends to have the exact opposite of the desired effect. Not always, but almost always.

[vetran]

As a firm capitalist, which things do you think should be run by the state out of interest DA? I assume you would agree some services don't really fit a capitalist model?

I think lots of services should be effectively regulated by Government. Not sure there isn't a place for privatising many services in part or whole but we should ride them hard!

[d000hg]

As a firm capitalist, which things do you think should be run by the state out of interest DA? I assume you would agree some services don't really fit a capitalist model?

[DodgyAgent]

I hardly see discussing the idea of de-privatising certain services as being especially controversial. Neither privatising everything nor having the state run everything are good ideas so you'd expect the line to be constantly moving depending who is in power and how society is leaning at any given time.

You pull out the best dynamics of both ideologies and then work them into a manageable solution. Unfortunately most people see handling of former state and now private monopolies as political symbolism.

[d000hg]

I hardly see discussing the idea of de-privatising certain services as being especially controversial. Neither privatising everything nor having the state run everything are good ideas so you'd expect the line to be constantly moving depending who is in power and how society is leaning at any given time.

[tomtomagain]

And so does democracy in the end. People vote for an easy life that's unsustainable.

I don't agree with you. Democracies provide the space to challenge the status-quo and to make changes.

They are noisy and messy and take time to get to the right solution, but what other system would you rather have?

[BrilloPad]

If you like the outdoors (snowboarding, mountain biking etc) it can be pretty exciting. They do go to bed a bit early though.

If you like eating cats its not bad either I suppose. And that directory of who owns which numberplate is quite good - so if you see a bird you fancy driving round you can pop round to her place later.

[doodab]

Though I would rather live anywhere than Switzerland. Its soooooo boring.

If you like the outdoors (snowboarding, mountain biking etc) it can be pretty exciting. They do go to bed a bit early though.

[BrilloPad]

This is a problem. The political classes might be able to persuade some people to agree to radical medicine that would actually benefit everyone but the majority refuse to take it until it's watered down to the point of uselessness.

OTOH the Swiss system seems to have worked very well for a very long time. Perhaps what we need is a better form of democracy where people are more engaged. I think if they were more engaged they would be more inclined to educate themselves properly on the issues they were dealing with and so might be more inclined to vote for the "right thing".

Most in the UK think the right thing is cheap beer and a flat screen TV to watch the football on. Which they get.

Though I would rather live anywhere than Switzerland. Its soooooo boring.