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High costs, declining services, scandal-hit companies and eye-watering bonuses. These are the things British voters have long come to expect from private companies who have been given responsibility for delivering crucial public services.
Is it any surprise then that, when asked if they’d like these key services returned to the state and delivered by the public sector, their answer is a resounding “yes”?
New polling – by Survation for the campaign group I lead, 38 Degrees, and political consultancy Lodestone – reveals overwhelming support for renationalisation of a range of services, including water management, bus and rail services, household energy provision and Royal Mail.
Take water management: The research lays bare anger over the sewage crisis, with 72% of voters saying it should be taken out of the hands of Thames Water and co, and run by the state instead. With 38 Degrees’s recent investigation revealing water companies have racked up more than 1,000 criminal convictions since privatisation, is it any wonder voters have concluded that the only viable solution is for the state to take the whole thing back?
Indeed, with the Water Bill progressing through Parliament, ministers would be wise to heed this research – and the 90,000 plus people who’ve signed the 38 Degrees petition – by ensuring the legislation is as strong as possible.
But ministers should also take strength from the knowledge that, where they’ve begun taking bold action to bring services back into public ownership – like our buses and rail networks – the public backs them, with 69% saying bus services should be run in the public sector and 71% saying the same about our railways. Media noise about taking back control of busses and trains has been sceptical, but it is right in line with the public mood.
But public ownership alone is not enough: these services also have to be affordable. When respondents were asked which modes of transport the Government should encourage people to take, buses were the most popular at 46%, compared to just 8% who said car travel. But with the bus cap soon rising from £2 to £3 – a huge 50% increase – ministers are at risk of undermining their own efforts.
Likewise, with winter fast approaching, support for energy renationalisation reflects widespread dissatisfaction towards energy companies and follows calls from hundreds of thousands of members of the public to ensure more is done to protect vulnerable customers. A separate poll for the End Fuel Poverty Coalition recently showed that 75% of voters support a social energy tariff to give discounted bills for those who need it most. Ministers must listen, to stop people falling through the cracks this winter.
Ultimately it comes down to this: Whether it’s seeing sky-high energy payments lining the pockets of greedy CEOs or rivers and coastlines polluted by sewage, the public are wise to the severe risks that come with allowing for-profit companies to run key services – and want ministers to do more to ensure ordinary people don’t pay the price.
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