Premier Kathleen Wynne’s Ontario government is thinking to privatize all or part of Hydro One. Sigh.

We have seen this movie before. It was a bad idea in its previous incarnations. It still is.

Hydro One is the Crown corporation that builds and operates the electricity grid. Its transmission wires pick up power at the point of generation and deliver it to cities and hamlets for local distribution.

The transmission part of Hydro One’s business (there are others) is singularly efficient according to a government advisory panel chaired by former Toronto-Dominion Bank head Ed Clark.

In total, Hydro One produces close to $1 billion annually for the provincial coffers.

The utility also distributes electricity directly to customers in rural and northern communities, as well as Brampton.

Even here, Hydro One is no slouch. The Clark panel points out that Hydro One Brampton’s operating, maintenance and administrative cost per residential customer is among the lowest in the province — roughly half that of Toronto Hydro.

True, Hydro One has committed its own share of stupidities, including most recently a billing fiasco that left customers fuming. But in the main, it works.

Of necessity, power transmission is a monopoly (it would make no economic sense to have competing companies run parallel power lines from, say, the Pickering generating plant to Toronto).

Hydro One is, at least, a public monopoly. It is under public control. Its profits flow back to the public.

Even the Clark panel recognized this. It recommended that the province sell off Hydro One’s Brampton and other distribution businesses. But it said the transmission monopoly should remain in public hands.

Nonetheless, Wynne’s Liberal government is thinking of privatizing all or part of the entire Crown corporation.

The Globe and Mail says the government may start by selling 10 to 15 per cent of Hydro One to private investors, with more to follow. The Star reports the Liberals may sell up to 60 per cent of the utility.

The reason? To politicians looking for easy money, Hydro One is irresistible. Private investors would snap it up.

It is a cash cow. It delivers a product that few can do without. Unlike the province’s other main electricity corporation, Ontario Power Generation, Hydro One is not burdened with problematic nuclear plants.

As well, thanks to the efforts of former premier Mike Harris’ Conservative government, any unsustainable debt that might have burdened Hydro One has already been offloaded onto electricity ratepayers.

Harris got this particular privatization bandwagon rolling in 2001. He said his scheme to sell off Hydro One would net the government a fast $5.5 billion.

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But as public criticism mounted, the government began to get cold feet. Harris’ successor, Ernie Eves, first announced the government would maintain a 51 per cent share. Then, in 2003, he abruptly cancelled the privatization plan altogether.

In 2009 and again in 2010, then-Liberal premier Dalton McGuinty floated the idea of privatizing Hydro One but never followed through.

In 2012, when the Conservatives released a white paper calling for 49 per cent of the utility to be privatized, McGuinty placed his Liberals firmly on the side of public ownership.

“We’ve been there; we’ve done that; we have no intention whatsoever of returning back,” the Liberal premier said.

But now, it seems, they are.

When it comes to privatization, the Liberals never learn. Their decision to hand over new generating capacity in the province to private firms led to higher electricity rates.

Their decision to privatize the province’s air ambulance service led to the ORNGE fiasco.

The Liberals argue that electricity transmission rates will continue to be regulated, no matter who owns Hydro One.

They forget the Clark panel’s report on government assets, appropriately entitled “Retain and Gain.”

It makes the same point that has been made since the debate over Hydro One began 14 years ago. Beyond regulation, there is real value in keeping a lucrative and efficient electricity transmission monopoly fully in the public domain.

Thomas Walkom’s column appears Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday.

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