r/Glasgow Tools

Title
Author	meepmeep13
Comment	A long, long way from a Tory - my point is that privatisation can work with sufficient, well-designed regulation. The Tories' neo-liberal approach doesn't include the latter, so I would generally look outside the UK, such as to the Scandinavian countries and Germany, for successful well-regulated industries. They manage to be social democracies utilising private financing. Looking at the UK's basket cases (each of which is a substantial argument of its own) and saying that nationalisation is the answer is to avoid the actual issues in each case which don't disappear when you change the financing model. In many cases the major problems which plagued the early privatised systems in the 90s have now been fixed, and to enact transformational change back would risk it happening all over again. Really we're agreeing - we've been absolutely shite at privatisation in the UK because we're so bad at regulating and sacrificing to the neo-liberal altar. My point is that the failure of privatisation in the UK should not be taken as a de defacto case for nationalised industries, because we were shit at those too - and there is a whole spectrum of regulatory principles which mean at heart the difference need only be about financing if we want it to be. But as it stands I have as little faith in our (real or potential) government's ability to successfully establish well-run state companies as I do in them to successfully establish good regulators, because to my mind the principles required to do so are pretty much identical, and both main parties love ill-advised top-down non-technocractic interventions too much for either way to work.
Reddit Link	https://www.reddit.com/r/glasgow/comments/eta10d/public_bus_ownership_plans_off_the_table_after/ffm7kci/
Created	Sun 26th Jan 2020 2:43pm
Status	normal ()

A long, long way from a Tory - my point is that privatisation can work with sufficient, well-designed regulation. The Tories' neo-liberal approach doesn't include the latter, so I would generally look outside the UK, such as to the Scandinavian countries and Germany, for successful well-regulated industries. They manage to be social democracies utilising private financing.

Looking at the UK's basket cases (each of which is a substantial argument of its own) and saying that nationalisation is the answer is to avoid the actual issues in each case which don't disappear when you change the financing model. In many cases the major problems which plagued the early privatised systems in the 90s have now been fixed, and to enact transformational change back would risk it happening all over again.

Really we're agreeing - we've been absolutely shite at privatisation in the UK because we're so bad at regulating and sacrificing to the neo-liberal altar. My point is that the failure of privatisation in the UK should not be taken as a de defacto case for nationalised industries, because we were shit at those too - and there is a whole spectrum of regulatory principles which mean at heart the difference need only be about financing if we want it to be.

But as it stands I have as little faith in our (real or potential) government's ability to successfully establish well-run state companies as I do in them to successfully establish good regulators, because to my mind the principles required to do so are pretty much identical, and both main parties love ill-advised top-down non-technocractic interventions too much for either way to work.