Adrian Ringrose, the chief executive of Interserve, is missing the point when he says: ‘It’s very insulting to the 20,000 people that my company employs who work in public services to say that, because they work for a business that wants to make a profit, it means they don’t care any more about the service they are delivering’ (Adrian Ringrose profile, November 20–26).
Of course they care – that is human nature – but a company must hold its shareholders’ interests first. Good commercial service might be better than bad public service, but it will never match the best because of its never ending requirement for maximum profit.
