On Fri, 11 Nov 2005 21:15:52 +0000 (GMT), John Cartmell
wrote:

In article ,
Andy Hall wrote:
On Fri, 11 Nov 2005 12:16:58 +0000 (GMT), John Cartmell
wrote:

In article ,
Huge wrote:
Quite. If the "services" offered by the State are that good, why do they
have to be provided at the point of a gun?

They don't.
You're trolling?

No he's not. He's asking a direct, and very much to the point
question - viz. why is there no choice of provider?

He's lying.

There is really no need to resort to this kind of accusation.

There are services where for various reasons it is not appropriate to offer a
choice of provider and in those cases it is also inappropriate for them to be
under the control of a private company.

Such are very, very few.

Such services include those where it
would be stupid to provide multiple access points - eg gas, electricity,
telephone, water, sewerage - those where multiple provision would raise costs,
cause disruption, or produce conflict - eg fire, police, ambulance,
coastguard, trading standards, registrars

These are all obvious and I already illustrated them in an earlier
post.



- and those where competition would
remove a community provision - eg post, buses, trains, health, education.

All of these can be quite easily operated outside of state control and
benefit from being so.


Other consideration eg safety may also come into play.

State services are generally very good and cheap.

They are almost always poor and very expensive when all costs to the
taxpayer are taken into account.

- but this is rarely
appreciated until privatised. ;-(

and the improvements are realised.


--

..andy