Privatising public monopolies is always a good idea. Huge profits for the buyers at the public expense.
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!ukpolitics@lemm.ee appears to have vanished! We can still see cached content from this link, but goodbye I guess! :'(
I don't think it's purely a private thing though. As a country we haven't kept up with investment into our very antiqued infrastructure and it's going to take a lot to fix it.
Here in Wales our water is publicly owned but we are still seeing prices rises because guess what - capital investment has been put off because it's hard and expensive.
Dŵr Cymru isn't quite publicly owned. It is structured as a not for profit, public benefit company, but still is privately owned.
I believe this is far better than the structure of the English companies, but definately had some failings, probably partly due to having such a large area to cover, but with comparatively fewer people to serve (meaning less revenue).
They are then put in a situation where the UK government expects investment to come in privately, but then the shareholders are more likely to invest in the English companies with returns.
Yes austerity is also to blame , this doesn't counter the observation that private companies don't do their due diligence to invest. especially when they have been making profits.
Why is it water that people are complaining about? Water costs me about as much as a loaf of bread each day. The mortgage costs over 100 loaves of bread a day.
Because the cost keeps rising while the actual service provided (a human right) keeps getting worse (eg pumping shit into rivers)
Edit: just walked past the local drain that overflows with raw sewage 🥰
Wouldn't that be sewage strike then rather than water strike?
The water company controls both
Depends where you live it can be completely different companies.
Classic Lemmy.