Gusface is suggesting that the government can own businesses within a market.

Others are saying that a government monopoly in all areas of business is a bad idea.

They aren’t the same thing. There’s a difference between the government owning the Commonwealth Bank and owning all banks.

Letting Optus, Vodafone, Virgin, 3 etc in is why our mobile phone prices are much better than our broadband internet prices compared to other places in the world.

Shows
with respect,Ii think you are confusing Total control with Active participation

ie:the gvt is a player not the only player.

Communications should never have been opened up to competition by that dud Beazley.

But if that never happened we would be paying a fortune for mobile phone services AS WELL as broadband internet services.

Letting Optus, Vodafone, Virgin, 3 etc in is why our mobile phone prices are much better than our broadband internet prices compared to other places in the world.

So what would these government shops sell? And why couldn’t the same things be sold by private retailers?

As per the telstra example
In nsw the ahem ruckus re privatisation of electricicity involved a Retail side as well.

These shops provide a range of services from appliances thru to service/repair

I believe that Gvt acting as the ‘industry standard” could re-enter many areas it has privatised previously.

I am not sure that it shouldnt be in ALL sectors, but I do believe it should be more active in a hell of a lot more

Marky’s list earlier is certainly not exhaustive and provides a reasonable platform to start with

Communications competition is the reason why call prices are much lower and why there are several new and innovative products and services on offer.

Markets work. They may be imperfect but they work better than centrally planned bureaucracies.

And QANTAS is better privatised, because it flies more routes, and offers cheaper prices.

As has already been pointed out, this has virtually nothing to do with privatisation on it’s own but increased competition.