Even to an American where we have tons of privatized utilities this is a bit shocking to me. I haven’t really heard of privately owned water companies before. Although my region is a bit more into public ownership than most I guess. We have private gas supply and private internet but other utilities are public.
Predictably, those two are fucking awful and the other services run just fine. But the next town over has private electricity and it’s a total disaster.
I can see why Thatcher has such a poor reputation now.