Hydro-electric
THIS week the draft of the water prospec- tus dripped onto my desk with a resound- ing plop. It is the size of a telephone directory, and more exciting, but not much. I liked the bit about Yorkshire Water's attempts to find out where its drains are, especially those newly dignified with the rank of Critical Sewer. What is now plain is that the object of this exercise is to get the water boards off the Treasury's back, so that the large sums they need to spend will come from the customers and perhaps from the shareholders but not from the taxpayers. From that point of view the sale price is secondary. So expect the shares to be cheap — but do not assume that they are bargains. Today's unsettled markets make it dangerous to `stag' — that is, to apply for shares in the hope of selling them for an instant profit when dealings begin. Just imagine some new political crisis scything through prices while the letter allotting your water shares is still stuck in the Christmas post. What costs nothing and commits you to nothing is to register (by telephone until 15 Novem- ber: 0272 272 272) and get preferential rights for you and your household in your local water board's offer. These rights are worth having if you mean to hang on to the shares. Apply now, make your mind up later. What depresses me most about the water offer is the electricity offer treading on its heels. Another damn great thick
book — always scribble, scribble, scribble, eh, Mr Kleinwort? Thicker, we must fear, will be the promoters' idea of their poten- tial customers — or will someone learn, after all, from the patronising, costly and counter-productive campaign which was meant to soften us up for water? The mistake we can see coming with electricity is to fit this complex and colossal offer for sale into a timetable which is not financial but political. Everything has to be finished on time for the general election. This is simply not a sensible way to do business, on any scale, let alone on this scale. It can already be seen leading to fudge after hurried fudge, on competition policy, and most of all on nuclear power. The minister now in charge, John Wakeham, is quite enough of a tough-minded accountant to spot what is going wrong. I wonder whether he is tough-minded enough to say: Let's do this properly, in our own time, with the election behind us. As to the hole this would leave in John Major's projec- tions, Mr Wakeham can show him how to fill it. The Government owns more than £7 billion worth of British Telecom shares, already quoted, priced by the market, instantly saleable. We could even do with- out a campaign.
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