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To start with, we already have
nationalisation in its purest form in Northern Ireland where privatisation
never happened and where river pollution is considerably worse than in
mainland UK. In Wales there are not-for-profit water companies where the
pollution record is on a par with their English counterparts. Add to that a
study of the multiple different ownership models across Europe that
concluded there was no correlation between pollution outcomes and ownership
type.
Secondly, we do almost have de facto
nationalisation through the regulatory structure provided by Ofwat. As a
water company you are not free to set your own prices, build new facilities
nor invest without the say so of Ofwat. And that is without even taking
into account the planning system which positively discourages major
infrastructure projects. Anyone for a reservoir? Privatisation was meant to
unshackle the water industry from political oversight. Quite the reverse
has happened with water companies effectively becoming state service
providers of sewage treatment and water provision at below market cost.
Thirdly, even if we struck gold with
a renationalised water industry that transformed sewage treatment, we would
only be part of the way forward because, guess what, the farming industry
is a far greater polluter of our rivers. Do we need to nationalise farming
as well? Of course, that is absurd but logically if you consider the state
can reform one polluter why not all polluters?
And finally, there is abstraction,
something dear to my heart on the chalkstreams. Every year we lose dozens,
probably hundreds of miles of river, as the headwaters are terminally
sucked dry by the permanent lowering of the water table. Does anyone believe
that a government led water industry is going to pass up free water instead
of spending billions on new reservoirs, desalination plants and a national
grid for water?
The final irony is the WASP meeting
demographic: they are the Boomers (including myself) who have had the free
ride from the 1989 privatisation - thirty six years of cheap water. And not
only that but they have also probably indirectly benefitted from water
company profits though a state or private pension.
The narrative is that water companies
are owned by rapacious capitalists intent of fleecing the consumer, as sort
of cross between Rupert Murdoch and Mr Burns of The Simpsons cartoon
fame. The truth is more mundane. Water companies are for the most part
either publicly traded where pension funds hold large tranches of stock or
private companies where the primary investors are pension funds. One way or
another those much reviled dividends have often found their way back into
the bank accounts of the very people who put their hands up in favour of
renationalisation. Maybe they are turkeys as well.
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