plan for collapse of Thames Water

Sythe79 said:
I agree with you but letting it fail doesn't punish the people that profited from it, it's not a win to see it burn.
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Government to bail it out/take on the debts/pay off shareholders. Treasury will take a large hit no matter how it plays out.

Government to (reluctantly) run it for a few years, before selling it off for a fraction of its value to another private entity.

Given that we lurch from one ideologically-driven government to another and back again, there's no real way to stop this happening.

A future Tory government will sell it off again, guaranteed. Doesn't matter how terrible a deal that is for the country. When we collectively vote Tory we know what we're getting. They don't change.
 
What happens though to the bondholders? I would imagine a liquidator would be appointed and sell off the assets to recompense the bondholders first. So how are the customers protected in that scenario? More likely I assume it would be more like Welsh Water where the Government steps in and buys it for £1 and accepts the bond debt. The shareholders lose everything but they've made a killing on dividends over the years.
 
Sythe79 said:
I agree with you but letting it fail doesn't punish the people that profited from it, it's not a win to see it burn.
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I'm not looking for a win. I'm just looking for infrastructure to be back in government hands and for the tax payer not to bail out private company losses.
 
I agree that it should be the investors and shareholders who lose, not the government just picking up the tab for all. I think I read that some of the biggest owners are Canadian pension funds. Socialised losses is just the worst.
It sounds like there has been historic asset stripping going back years tho by previous owners - I wonder if that will/can be investigated.
 
Tom_ed1987 said:
I agree that it should be the investors and shareholders who lose, not the government just picking up the tab for all. I think I read that some of the biggest owners are Canadian pension funds. Socialised losses is just the worst.
It sounds like there has been historic asset stripping going back years tho by previous owners - I wonder if that will/can be investigated.
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There must be a case for criminal charges for running a company so badly. It seems unrealistic that people that get paid very well to run a monopoly can get away with this for all these years.

I think its time for the next Labour government to introduce some more laws a bit like the corporate manslaughter charges that had to be brought in after the Potters Bar train incident.

This just seems not that different to long firm fraud used by organised crime.
 
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Tom_ed1987 said:
I agree that it should be the investors and shareholders who lose, not the government just picking up the tab for all. I think I read that some of the biggest owners are Canadian pension funds. Socialised losses is just the worst.
It sounds like there has been historic asset stripping going back years tho by previous owners - I wonder if that will/can be investigated.
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I don't think it's asset stripping, rather the company was purchased with the costs of the purchase being applied to the company as debt. Instead of the operators then trying to pay off the debt they're allowed to accrue more as someone somewhere is very happy to be receiving the interest payments on that debt.
 
First power companies go bust , now we have problems with a water company.

This geniunly worries me because if thames water goes bust, it makes you think what fiancial state other utility companies are in.
(Im with essex and suffolk water, which is pretty much next door, crikey, if this goes full contagion, does this mean we will have to drink water from a local river and bath in the sea)

It reminds me of the financial crash of 2008...but rather than banks breaking , its now the utility companies . Whats worse this time is that the government can't just print out lots of money to bail this company out.

I never understand how we as a country can mess up such a simple thing as basic utilities
 
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Spannerhead said:
First power companies go bust , now we have problems with a water company.

This geniunly worries me because if thames water goes bust, it makes you think what fiancial state other utility companies are in.
(Im with essex and suffolk water, which is pretty much next door, crikey, if this goes full contagion, does this mean we will have to drink water from a local river and bath in the sea)

It reminds me of the financial crash of 2008...but rather than banks breaking , its now the utility companies . Whats worse this time is that the government can't just print out lots of money to bail this company out.
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People laugh at all of us that say public utilities should be in public hands.

Whats worse this time is that the government can't just print out lots of money to bail this company out.
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Sure they can. Well not to bail them out but certainly to take over but then comes who do this bunch of criminal MPs gets to choose which mate gets to reap the rewards.

www.theguardian.com

Thames Water in crisis talks over potential £10bn black hole

Minister tells Guardian government has ‘no grasp’ of cost involved in preventing possible collapse
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
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Sythe79 said:
I agree with you but letting it fail doesn't punish the people that profited from it, it's not a win to see it burn.
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let if fail and in addition arrest the CEO and all the execs and then punish them heavily financially i.e strip all their assets and money wheter on or offshore and plough it all back into Thames water when its back under public ownership. I am sure this government could legislate quickly for that if they actually had any stones.
 
wildman said:
let if fail and in addition arrest the CEO and all the execs and then punish them heavily financially i.e strip all their assets and money wheter on or offshore and plough it all back into Thames water when its back under public ownership. I am sure this government could legislate quickly for that if they actually had any stones.
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And make them pick fruit and veg.
 
Spannerhead said:
First power companies go bust , now we have problems with a water company.

This geniunly worries me because if thames water goes bust, it makes you think what fiancial state other utility companies are in.
(Im with essex and suffolk water, which is pretty much next door, crikey, if this goes full contagion, does this mean we will have to drink water from a local river and bath in the sea)

It reminds me of the financial crash of 2008...but rather than banks breaking , its now the utility companies . Whats worse this time is that the government can't just print out lots of money to bail this company out.

I never understand how we as a country can mess up such a simple thing as basic utilities
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And a bunch of altnets (BT competitors) are going bust right now as well.. In places you've got 4 or 5 altnets laying cables int he same place (expected to be profitable) whilst in other areas *nobody* is laying cables (not even BT are interested). Is this the much-lauded "private sector efficiency" we're seeing?

This is the promised land of privatised core infrastructure. Meanwhile, other comparable countries are not having such problems... I wonder why.

Also (as I've been moaning about in another thread :p) BT is skipping over between 10-15% of urban properties* with their FTTP rollout, and have no plans to go back, because they're not economically viable. *Not properties in the far end of nowhere, urban properties that they class as "difficult" to upgrade.

So in the end, the taxpayer is going to pick up the bill for BT to service these houses, just as they would if telecoms was a critical/core infrastructure still in state control...

Somebody earlier said BT was one of the "good" privatisations. Bugger that. It's been just as awful as the rest of them.
 
Not only is the company in debt.. Its also in a dire state.

The amount of leakage across water companies is shocking.

Its disgusting this has been allowed.



There is no reason why a company can be public and we'll run. Never seems to happen. But no reason it can't.

These regulatory bodies need to grow backbones and sort this out.
 
Sythe79 said:
honestly, where did you think those extra profits would be made ? all those unconvinced potential new customers out there refusing to buy commie water beforehand all those years ? or maybe all water needed was a good private marketing team to come up with new water zero ?
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for the record at no point have I ever been in favour of privatising critical services. it just doesn't work. changes were needed back in the day but you don't get rid of the golden goose and let someone else take the golden eggs whilst leaving us to clean up the bird crap.
 
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