After the announcement of yet another price hike of 6% on top of my £330 per month gas bill, I have decided to speak with British Gas to discuss my options and probably leave them for a more competitive supplier. On phoning them today - the day that they announce their increase, the Customer Service Department is closed this morning for staff training........... couldn't make it up.
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opting out of the fixed price deal we have and moving to another supplier, possibly Scottish or Eon.
The issue with publicly owned companies has always been culture which can promote waste. But this is something that is easily fixed - you simply have a small number of organisational motivations that are etched in stone that everybody must adhere to. We always seem to have to have one extreme or th eother in this Country.
Even in the middle of a recession the energy suppliers profits are higher than ever, only achievable because they operate as a cartel. The rich don't stay rich by being generous to their customers ....
Have a read of this - http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utilities/you-switch-gas-electricity
Thatcher told us year after year Nationalised industries lost us money, where shit and the "level playing field" of the Free Market would be OPEN competion drive down costs and increase effiecies ----------total bollox
The nationalised industires borrowed money re building power stations etc.That debt was written off by Thatcher---that was money owed to us as tax payers.She then sold our Utility companies to us !!! when we already owned em-----except they were brought by huge so called multi nationals (some owned by other Governements) --lie---a con---a con-------and an ongoing lie.
Still the Tories wave the Union flag whilst selling everything they can and could.
The problem is that you have to keep chopping and changing all the time which is ridiculous. The idea that competition would bring the prices down looked feasible on paper but has been shown to be ridiculous. If I change from british gas to another comapny - what actually changes? Does my gas come from another place? Companies waste money advertisng and competing with each other for customers which they should be using to cut prices but they know that competing on price would hurt their profits.
The issue with publicly owned companies has always been culture which can promote waste. But this is something that is easily fixed - you simply have a small number of organisational motivations that are etched in stone that everybody must adhere to. We always seem to have to have one extreme or th eother in this Country.
The domestic energy supply industry in this country is little more than a cartel. Therefore, the concept of competition is bogus. It's in none of the suppliers interests to have a price war which would force down prices and thus consumers bills continue to rise.
Even in the middle of a recession the energy suppliers profits are higher than ever, only achievable because they operate as a cartel. The rich don't stay rich by being generous to their customers ....
Said it all lads it isn't really a free market at all as they all buy the gas/electricity from the same source and I for one got sick of changing suppliers to try and secure the best deal. There is supposed to be an Ombudsman looking into this personally I would love his job as it appears to entail doing f**k all!
nothing wrong with free enterprise MOL but simples is right because the so called choice doesn't exist in the same way as for instance buying your weekly shopping where true competition exists. On top of that they rarely (if ever) reduce prices down when the gas price is lower, in fact this is true today as the gas price is lower than the same time last year. The prices are high for one simple reason to create value and profit for shareholders, nothing wrong with that unless you are rip[ping off the market and I am afraid that is what is happening here and once again the government do nothing about it.
And before we get into the latest round of Tory bashing this situation proliferated under the last government as well!
/rant
There is one reason and one reason only that privatisation happened, to keep the Tories in power. They wanted to offer tax breaks to the middle classes to secure votes, but to do that they needed money. At the same time there were a load of nationalised industries that needed investment urgently. So the choice was, invest in the country, or give tax breaks, and they chose (as they always will) the latter.
Same with right to buy. This wasn't some noble scheme to get people onto the housing ladder, it was a cynical plan to turn labour voting council tenants into conservative voting home owners, with the added bonus of bringing short term funds into the councils allowing them to look good by either offering lower taxes or spending on headline projects. The problem is of course that councils now have no housing stock, so we have massive waiting lists, and when someone needs housing urgently the councils end up paying extortionate rents to private landlords. And when I say extortionate I really mean it. Some friends of mine were recently put in emergency housing in dartford, a crappy 2 up 2 down terraced cottage near the railway line. It was in terrible condition, cold, damp, dirty. The council were paying £1200 a month for that property. If the landlord was just doing a standard private let they would be very very lucky to get much over £500 a month. We're paying that, every one of us through higher taxes, hence council tax keeps going up whilst services get cut. Everything we owned was sold off to offer tax cuts in the late 80s/early 90s. It's gone now and we'll never get it back as no politician will every spend what is necessary to buy back what we once had, even if it would save us a fortune in the long run.
There you go though, democracy, where anything beyond the next election is largely meaningless and short term thinking prevails. The house of lords was supposed to be the counter-balance to this short-termism, but then they stuffed it full of political party members, driving the very short term agendas they were supposed to balance out.
Not looking forward to delivering our baby in the cellar with a couple of towels and some hot water because there are no free hospitals in this country.