Italian Privatisation

[WatcherZero]

Been announced the date for the Italian air traffic control and Ferrovie dello Stato (holding company for the nationalised rail companies in Italy) will be privatised from is 2016.

Air traffic control and national post service sell off had previously been announced in May while Merrily Lynch had been appointed in January to advise on sale of Ferrovie but the government had wobbled on the privatisation last month.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

On the same subject in Spain, I found this graffiti on the walls of a brand new station in Galicia last week.
Spain is going through a similar privatisation process.

 

[nw1]

Someone should tell these idiotic politicians that many of us do not like nor appreciate privatisation. It seems somewhere that there is a factory churning out mindless vapid dogmatists like Hameron, Rajoy and whatever sleazebag is in charge of Italy right now - people that subscribe to the religion of Thatcherism like zombies and implement it no matter what people want.

It's absolutely disgusting the way that some political party with right-wing views can flog off railways without a referendum. At least Spain (IIRC) has the chance to boot out Rajoy and his "Partido Popular" (lol) this year.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Someone should tell these idiotic politicians that many of us do not like nor appreciate privatisation. It seems somewhere that there is a factory churning out mindless vapid dogmatists like Hameron, Rajoy and whatever sleazebag is in charge of Italy right now - people that subscribe to the religion of Thatcherism like zombies and implement it no matter what people want.
It's absolutely disgusting the way that some political party with right-wing views can flog off railways without a referendum. At least Spain (IIRC) has the chance to boot out Rajoy and his "Partido Popular" (lol) this year.

Unfortunately they are in hock to the banks big time for overspending before the big crash.
All those fancy new High Speed lines come at a cost.
Their credit rating (=mortgage rate) is at risk if they don't reduce public debt.
It's not that different here really.

 

[Comstock]

Unfortunately they are in hock to the banks big time for overspending before the big crash.
All those fancy new High Speed lines come at a cost.
Their credit rating (=mortgage rate) is at risk if they don't reduce public debt.

Indeed, I'm not sure how much different it would be if the centre left were in power. You can win individual skirmishes but ultimately you can't buck the market- if you borrow money you ultimately have to pay it back and balance the books


Another reason why I am against HS2.

 

[MarkyT]

Whoever ends up operating the trains or managing the infrastructure in these countries, I really hope the 'freehold' of the rail right of way network remains with the State. At least that potentially retains the opportunity for future generations to reassemble a national operator again 'Corbyn-style' in the future and means the big decisions over the size of the physical network would remain in democratic hands. The same concern applies for any potential breakup of Network Rail in UK.

 

[ainsworth74]

Do we have any details on what format the privatisation will take? Are they just going to sell off Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane (owner of Trenitalia [trains] and Rete Ferroviaria Italiana [infrastructure]) as one lump or are they going to splinter things up a bit more the same way we did?

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Do we have any details on what format the privatisation will take? Are they just going to sell off Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane (owner of Trenitalia [trains] and Rete Ferroviaria Italiana [infrastructure]) as one lump or are they going to splinter things up a bit more the same way we did?

Looks like they are selling up to 40% shares in the whole FS group, which will stay as a single entity.
So the whole lot will still be under government control.
http://www.railjournal.com/index.php/europe/fs-prepares-for-partial-privatisation-in-2016.html

I suppose it's equivalent to selling shares in BR plc (1993).
This was the plan for DB too, until they dumped the plans recently.

Mind you, Italian privatisations are weird affairs.
Alitalia looked like being liquidated recently, then was going to be sold to AFKL, but Etihad has given it a new lease of life by taking 49%.

 

[WatcherZero]

The EU rules don't require separation of ownership between infrastructure and operator just separation of accounts and freedom for open access operators (which Italy already has though there has been price wars by the state operator to try and force them out of business).

Will be interesting to see if this 40% disposal is compliant with the upcoming Fourth Railway Package though which makes tendering of public rail services mandatory by 2019, the principal motivation to force the breakup of the state monopolies of SNCF and DB.