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@RichardJMurphy How much would it cost to nationalise the UK's water industry?
The number that is bandied around is £90 billion. You'll also hear them saying it's going to be paid for by taxpayers' money.
There are issues with their claims.
£90 billion was an estimate by a very right wing think tank who thought if you nationalise water you would have to repay all the debts owed by the water companies to the loan financiers who have kept them in business and profited heavily by doing so.
That's total nonsense. If a company is bust, you don't pay off the loan financiers to it. You pay a fair value for the business, and that is it.
What's the fair value of the water companies right now, given that they are both actually financially insolvent in some cases, like Thames Water, or environmentally insolvent in the sense that they can't actually deliver us clean water without it being full of, let's be blunt, shit, in most cases.
Well, their value is nothing. Literally, precisely pounds zero, or maybe £1 each.
That's the price we should pay for the water companies.
Would we have to pay taxpayers' money to bail these companies out? Let's not talk nonsense here. We have nationalised companies in the past, & what do we use to nationalise companies? We issue new debt to nationalise companies.
Not a single penny raised from taxpayers is involved in any way at all, because firstly, there will be almost nothing to pay. And secondly, bonds will pay for it.
#uk_politics #ukwater