Should it be sold?? The government claims selling it will "increase competition".
Voters need to remember a the outcomes of some previous sales of government businesses.
- Commonwealth Bank: well bank CEOs are paid ever-more handsomely these days. Bank fees have been introduced and risen inexorably. The interest rate paid on bak accounts was a minimum of 3.25% ...once upon a time. Now it's 0.1%, and the fees are usually greater than the interest received.
- Telstra: enough said? Certainly line rentals have increased markedly. Its INternet plans are expensive; it is currently wrestling with the ACCC to increase its wholesale prices (so competitors' plans must rise & be less competitive)
- Privatisation of the Wheat Board to create AWB: certainly there were/are some well-paid executives, but what of AWB ethics and the anti-competitive stance of farmers; farmers' organisations; the National Party and the Federal Government. It surely can't argue that "increased competitiveness" is a reason for selling, when it maintains that it is acceptable fro AWB to operate as a monopoly!
I believe that a well-run government organisation can help competitiveness within the industry, because it is less likely to be as "indulgent" as some of its privately-owned competitors.
Medibank Private should not be sold.
The Analyst
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