Madam, - Fintan O'Toole's column of November 23rd, "Delusions about state companies", succeeds quite breathtakingly in depicting some imaginary world with which I for one have no familiarity.
The Ireland where citizens are systematically overcharged and exploited by State companies, where politicians and public-sector unions conspire in an unholy alliance to rob the citizen, both as taxpayer and as consumer, is still there. The key point missed by Mr O'Toole is that only market forces (supported, oddly, by the European Commission) protect us from being fleeced further.
The fact that some semi-State companies report profits is largely due to two factors. Firstly, they command a monopoly; and secondly, they have been permitted for decades (by their own shareholder) to exploit it. The ESB is one such case. This was exposed as recently as last week in the Cap Gemini report, which showed that electricity prices in Ireland are among the highest in Europe. With a monopoly and an indulgent regulatory regime, anybody can make a profit.
The same goes for the late Aer Rianta. In that case, although the regulator was not quite as tolerant, there was no alternative and we poor travellers were (and remain) forced to use that company's dilapidated facilities.
Eircom is an interesting case. Mr O'Toole marvels that the "national" telecommunications company turned a profit of £197 million in 1997 but has reported losses in each of the past two years. Anyone not condemned to Mr O'Toole's world of economic fantasy would conclude from this that Eircom remained profitable as long as it commanded a monopoly and was owned by a compromised Government. Once we had a whiff (and it's still no more than that) of competition and an independent regulator (more poodle than rottweiler, admittedly) Eircom's weaknesses were exposed.
I always find it illuminating to draw an analogy between business and professional sport. Saying, as Mr O'Toole does, that State-owned monopolies can be profitable is like saying that Dublin City can win the league as long as they don't actually have to play anybody on the way.
If sporting matches were decided in smoke-filled back rooms by political apparatchiks rather than on the playing field, then professional sport would be the same corrupt shambles that the semi-States were and, in some cases, remain. - Yours, etc.,
Dr NORMAN STEWART, Seapark, Malahide, Co Dublin.