Sir – As Bill Mackeith points out (Letters, July 1), most of the service industry is now in private hands, where it clearly should not be.

Unfortunately there are a number of politicians who have this unhealthy belief that everything should be in private hands, although, I suspect, that the driving force is greed.

Post Second World War, the gas, electricity suppliers and railways were in a mess. Gas and electricity was generated in each town – Oxford’s gas being produced in St Ebbe’s, and electricity by the River Thames at Osney. In the case of electricity, different standards prevailed over the country with different voltages and in Swindon the supply was in DC. The post-war government brought all these diverse suppliers together and these industries went through a process of modernisation.

The railways had suffered from a lack of investment which, to a large extent, was the result of the war. Dogma then took over and these up-to-date industries were then privatised, or should I say almost given away.

The private sector works best when there is competition to encourage innovation and invention, although one gets the impression that some business managements go out of their way to kill off any competition. In the case of the service industries, there never can be competition, which means that another layer of bureaucracy, in the form of ombudsmen, has to be put in place to try to prevent misuse.

Derrick Holt
Headington