Make services work for public not just profit

It’s a funny thing, for some 20 odd years the power companies have had a free for all situation to make as much profit as possible out of we poor consumers.

All these years, profits have been considerable but all of a sudden with Ed Miliband’s speech at the Labour conference stating he will freeze their prices, they are threatening us with power shortages.

What have they been doing with their profits all these years?

A great proportion has been paid out to shareholders, funds that really could have remained within the industry to both renew equipment and maintain affordable prices.

Prices have continued to rise alarmingly and profits have remained high, yet they have the temerity to threaten that a price freeze from 2015 will cause power shortages as their investment in new plant will suffer.

I ask the question – why have they not invested in new plant these past 20 years? And why, all of a sudden, will there be problems from 2015? Have their investments been non-existent, has all their profit been siphoned off to foreign owners by the use of creative accounting?

Whilst I have never been a socialist, I really think that it is about time that all gas and electricity generation and distribution was once more controlled though a publicly owned company with ALL profit going into infrastructure and the maintenance of affordable prices.

From: Mrs ML Cook, Parkside Close, Cottingham, East Yorkshire.

If you asked people what they voted for in the last election how many would say they wanted the Health Service to be privatised? Or education to be changed so often that it is in disarray? Who voted for this country to lose control of its borders? Or for vast amounts of money to be handed over to the EU?

Why would anyone vote for so many of our businesses to be sold that most of the profits leave this country?

Most people do not realise that many of our public service companies are in the hands of a firm called Serco led by a South African, Chris Hymen CBE, making a profit of many millions paid for by us.

Who can we vote for now as the major parties all caused the mess this country is now in?

From: David Quarrie, Lynden Way, Holgate, York.

Ed Miliband did well to speak for over an hour with no notes or visual aids, but as regards the energy companies, he did not go far enough.

It will be difficult to really enforce a price freeze for 20 months. Harold Wilson tried unsuccessfully to introduce a Prices and Incomes policy.

What Labour needs to do is reverse the Conservatives’ rotten policy of selling off vital utilities like gas, water, electricity and coal into private (usually foreign) ownership, and re-nationalise them all.

There should not be shareholders, dividends, profits, where basic, essential, services are concerned. The ever increasing cost of living is a major worry to millions of voters, but we need more than rhetoric, clever speeches and tinkering policies to overcome this ever bigger headache.

Childhood dream denied

From: Rachel Hodson, Austerfield, Doncaster

WHEN I was a little girl, I pushed dolls around in my toy pram. I read them stories, put them to bed at night, and during playtime when they got poorly they always made full recoveries.

In my scenarios, there were never too few beds, a shortage of staff or the prospect of a fragmented service. And in real life, I was always sure that our NHS would be there for me when I was a grown-up.

However, as a first-time expectant mother myself 
with the prospect of a real 
baby to look after come the new year, my childhood rosy view of the nation’s proudest achievement is quickly turning overcast.

Tony Pearson (Yorkshire Post, September is right. The NHS 
staff I’ve met along my journey 
to motherhood have been a credit to our country.

But they’ll tell you they’re under pressure and are having to cope with fewer resources.

The Government doesn’t seem to realise that their back-door privatisation is tearing apart our beloved institution, changing it beyond all recognition.

Come my due date, fingers crossed I’m met with a friendly smile – and not asked instead for the name of my health insurance provider.

Kill dealers to defeat drugs

From: John Watson, Hutton Hill, Leyburn.

I see that the two British women arrested in Peru for smuggling drugs decided to plead guilty after insisting that they were innocent of the charge and had been forced into it.

It is said that they did so to try to get a shorter prison term. There is also a move afoot to let them serve any sentence they receive back in Britain.

That should never be allowed. It is a serious crime and it needs a serious sentence.

It is time we adopted what they do in Indonesia and other places in the Far East, with a threat of the ultimate punishment.

I am afraid that I can’t have any sympathy whatsoever with drug smugglers. They try to make a fortune out of the exercise while condemning their victims to years of misery. A lot of such victims will inevitably turn to crime to fund their habit, creating more misery for them and their families. We are never going to solve the drug problem by being lenient in sentencing. It should be made very plain to those who are thinking of trying to make a fast buck in this filthy business what to expect.