NBC sell-offs a bargain says watchdog
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• National Bus Company subsidiaries were sold off too cheaply, the Government spending watchdog, the National Audit Office, has ruled.
In a report published last week, the NAO says that National Bus rejected a suggestion that individual benchmarks be set for subsidiaries when the company was privatised in 1986.
A total of 62 operating subsidiaries were sold as going concerns over 21 months — 18 of those deals were negotiated with single bidders. "Early subsidiaries were sold proportionately cheaper than the later ones," says the NAO.
It concedes that the sale took place during a period of "considerable uncertainty" in the bus industry and admits that it "represents a very creditable achievement."
It adds that the Department of Transport, which oversaw the privatisation, took "considerable care to safeguard the taxpayer from having property resold after privatisation."
▪ Smoking is to be banned on London buses from 14 February after a survey showed that 73% of passengers backed such a move.