“Water is a fundamental human right” became the moral centre of a vote in which Yes won by more than five to one. The striking feature was not simply the scale of the verdict, but how often support for a veto arrived carrying a larger demand: public control of an essential monopoly.
The floor’s most-respected Yes case called the golden share “an immediate, emergency stepping stone to clip wings”, before arguing for the whole network to return to public hands. Other supporters described water as something customers cannot opt out of, with one saying a golden share would provide “a direct backstop” where regulation had failed.
The No side was smaller and more defensive, but its objection was coherent: the problem was government competence, not ownership structure. One voter warned that “the idea of giving government more control is terrifying”, while another insisted this should be done through “proper regulations not bad corporate structure”; the sharpest formulation was that “competence might” matter more than new laws.
That left the two sides talking past each other. Yes voters were arguing from stewardship, debt, pollution and the extraction of dividends, with the floor’s second-most-respected case saying profits should be reinvested in infrastructure and lower bills; some even proposed minority public stakes rather than outright nationalisation. No voters, by contrast, feared that a state veto would reproduce the failures of the regulator it was meant to supplement.
The chamber therefore answered a narrow governance question with a broader verdict on who should hold the levers of an essential service: the golden share was endorsed, but many voters plainly regarded it as a beginning, not a settlement.
23 Opinions
Yes but the golden share should be as an immediate, emergency stepping stone to clip wings while building up to full public ownership... bring the whole network back into 100% public hands. Water is a fundamental human right. For 30 years, private equity has treated our taps like an ATM, stripping out £70bn in dividends while racking up debt and dumping filth in our rivers. I think we need to stop dancing around corporate interests with half-measures.
Totally in favour of this, it should be a first step in renationalisation of water, gas and electricity. I hope the pm goes the whole way which will take much undoing of what has been before.
Yes but - the people holding the golden share will be the same calibre of people who were supposed to be regulating water via Ofwat. Although I suppose the golden share dumbs down the decision they have to make to their braincell level - a big gold NO button.
Water is essential, it’s not a commodity people can opt out of. The long term answer should be public ownership, with profits reinvested into infrastructure and keeping bills down rather than extracted by shareholders.
Water is a natural monopoly with no real market discipline Customers can't switch suppliers, so the usual competitive check on bad management doesn't exist. Regulation (Ofwat) is meant to substitute for that, but critics argue it's proven too weak to stop firms loading up on debt or underinvesting — a golden share would give the state a direct backstop rather than relying entirely on a regulator that can be out-lobbied or under-resourced.
It's also worth noting that when privatised under Margaret Thatcher we did hold "Golden Shares"; these were challenged and made unlawful by the European Court of Justice and had to be removed under Tony Blair. So while desirable this would be a complete no-no in the EU.
It had one but the Labour Party got rid of it. So all their bleatings about Privatisation are on them. It’s not been an unmitigated success but I would bet the amount invested would still exceed what a State owned utility would fund as State always has other priorities in spending / giving away our money. The point is priorities & there are Political issues like sewage discharge and mending leaks that nobody really wants to address as it then reveals the real issues at hand.
YES Without a doubt.. There's a clue in those sort of services name..... PUBLIC utilities not private! We've seen clearly that privatised utility companies are all about shares & borrowing money to pay shareholders dividends. They certainly NOT about giving a good public service, that needs to change & CEOs and managment boards have proved they can't be trusted to do this, so yes the publics representatives need the golden share.
Just use the powers that Ofwat has and pay for decent people to enforce the. Macquarie ran rings around Ofwat creating the problem. More laws aren't going to help - competence might
This should be done via proper regulations not bad corporate structure