Letters: Utilities Are Public Services and Should Not Be Run as Businesses

A reader letter responded to a piece by Will Hutton and Andy Haldane that proposed turning utilities into public-benefit companies, arguing that the proposal does not go far enough in rethinking how essential services should be run.

Hutton and Haldane had suggested restructuring utilities so that delivering high-quality services becomes their primary, constitutional objective, with profitability treated as subordinate to that broader goal, while still operating as companies.

A different model

The letter writer argued that utilities should not be run as businesses at all, even with a public-interest mandate, contending that business models are inherently unsuited to delivering services that carry social and environmental responsibilities alongside economic ones.

As an alternative example, the letter pointed to the structure of local government in Scotland prior to the creation of the Scottish Parliament, when regional authorities held powers and responsibilities for a wide range of coordinated functions, including water and sewerage, operated at a strategic regional level for roughly two decades.

The response reflects an ongoing debate in the UK over how best to manage utilities such as water, energy, and sewerage, balancing calls for greater public accountability against different models of ownership and governance.

The letter did not propose a fully detailed alternative structure beyond citing the historical Scottish regional model as a point of reference for how utilities might be organized outside a conventional business framework.