Public sector management: privatisation as an answer

"To see privatisation and private sector practices as the answer to the problems of public services is to fail to understand the essential differences between the public and private realm. The public realm often has to deliver services that are essentially unprofitable, such as accident and emergency services. In these cases, efficiency and effectiveness cannot be measured by profitability and different measures relevant to the public domain are necessary." In relation to the inherent differences …

…citizens. Lawton (1994) acknowledges that privatisation is widely criticised. It is widely accepted that all privatisation does is turn a state monopoly into a private monopoly and the consumer is unaware of the benefits that privatisation was supposed to produce. Also newly privatised companies have not faced competition before. As a whole "The public sector continues to finance and deliver core goods and services that are of a major significance to society as a whole." (Ferlie, 1996, 3)