It may sound like I am out to lunch, but there are some powerful arguments for socialised convenience shopping. We could introduce a new system that could smash the establishment, increase diversity, decrease carbon emissions, and ensure that you can always buy salt and vinegar crisps.
Why is it madness to nationalise the unco-ordinated, chaotic sprawl of corner shops across the country? We know nationalisation is popular, so let’s have more of it. Especially of small businesses, because, actually, Margaret Thatcher was the first person to care about them. Yeah. Thatcher.
For starters convenience shops are an obvious natural monopoly. Also, the current fragmented system is inefficient. Yes, that’s right, the fragmented inevitable monopoly. If that doesn’t make sense nothing does. And the fact is that you cannot just go in and buy anything you – like my book – in most of the nation’s stores. The reason for this is that the shops are putting profits ahead of people.
The eternal irritation of the corner shop user is that that it will be slightly more expensive than larger shops and cannot have everything you want. This affects everyone. Sometimes even David Cameron. It also affects Richard Brown in Brighton who you have never heard of. He paid three pounds over the odds for pretty mediocre bottle of Ernest & Julio Gallo wine last week.
Darren in Southend reports a grim tale of austerity-fuelled despair from his local corner shop: although they will usually have Kit-Kats they will never have chunky Kit-Kats. Anyone who thinks they half-understand Keynesian economics knows that chunkiness can unleash animal spirits and kickstart the economy. Why do the Tories do this? Why do the Lib Dems let them?
The reality is that we all know what can go wrong in a corner shop. John in South London was once given the wrong change. Brenda in Rochdale was once given a pack of Marlboroughs rather than Lights. It is the unique horror of capitalism not only to be a system in which people make mistakes, but you have to take your business elsewhere rather than write a letter of complaint.
The real mistake though is to think the corner shop is a triumph of the private sector. Who built those corners in the first place? The government that’s who. As for the goods they stock, well many consumer goods industries probably only got off the ground because of big government orders for everything from the 18th century Royal Navy to the 1940s US armed forces.
The reality is that what we have here is a natural monopoly, because, err because, how can each corner have more than one shop? Oh, and if it isn’t a monopoly, if there are two convenience shops on one street, well how wasteful and inefficient is that? They stock the same goods and sell at the same prices, as if they have the same customers and suppliers and people want mostly the same stuff.
The case for nationalisation is overwhelming once you are glib and simplistic about it. We could create an integrated corner shop network, with stores precisely separated and always stocked to meet people’s needs, not the needs of the corporations. Susan from Portsmouth need never again go to the shop and find that there is no Monster Munch for her 6 year old. Profits could then be reinvested in a high-tech, low carbon, diversity programme delivered on the Guardian website.
Under people’s ownership the shops could then be ethical, with no products made by Israelis, or for some reason no one quite understands, Gazans either. Procurement of goods for the shop could also be used to drive a green industrial revolution, which is a really great idea, just like coal mines were.
Of course this wouldn’t be run by a bunch of bureaucrats, oh no. It would be run by a true people’s panel, composed of people, good people, chosen to sit on a panel. We could then have true diversity in ownership. I haven’t looked into it but I am willing to bet that corner shops are owned by the usual public school elite. Finally, we can smash that system and spread ownership to all in society. Has anyone thought of what some of the ethnic minority communities could deliver through a socialised system?
All this doesn’t have to be costly either. Everyone could have their corner shop compensated for with a free BBC license, Guardian subscription and copy of my book.
Far-fetched? Next time you are in a store open long after your surgery, school council office or Job Centre Plus has closed but, cruelly, oh so cruelly, it doesn’t stock pork scratchings, you ask yourself if it’s far-fetched. And if you happen to agree with me I will quote you like it’s Gospel.
Because let’s face it, nationalisation offers one thing for sure, a chance to put losses before people.
4 Responses to Corner shops have let us down – it’s time to nationalise them