Danny Alexander says that the government has not made a final decision over whether to sell its share in Eurostar, but he makes clear that he favours this direction.

In the opinion of the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, government "shouldn't be owning assets it doesn't need and can be more effectively invested in the private sector."

This is the privateers' mantra trotted out since Margaret Thatcher's government initiated the fraudulent "Tell Sid" campaign to privatise the public monopoly British Gas.

In return for a one-off windfall for the Exchequer, public assets were sold for a song to the finance sector, which wasted no time in buying up the holdings of small shareholders eager to realise a quick profit.

The private sector's "effective investment" cited by Alexander has provided the bitter fruits force-fed to consumers.

Gas, electricity, water, rail, buses, civil airports, air traffic control, telecommunications and, most recently, Royal Mail were all said to need the private sector's access to investment and managerial expertise, which could only be enjoyed once the dead hand of public ownership was lifted.

The reality has been short-term profits taking precedence over customer service and public accountability.

Despite the extravagant claims made on behalf of the private sector, all major investment projects are either financed or guaranteed by the state.

The Tory government planned to have the high-speed rail link from the Channel to London (HS1) built by private consortium London and Continental Railways (LCR), comprising National Express, Virgin, bankers SG Warburg, Bechtel and London Electric as part of the Eurotunnel project.

LCR hit the rocks in 1998 and had to be bailed out with public money.

One of the first acts of the conservative coalition in 2010 was to sell HS1, which had cost the Exchequer £6bn to build, to a Canadian-led set-up for little more than a third of that amount.

In contrast to this private-sector shambles, the Eurostar project was a successful joint venture between the now publicly owned LCR and the French and Belgian state-owned railways.

Passenger numbers increased to nearly 10 million last year, with operating profit doubling to £52.3 million.

No surprise that greedy speculators have their eyes on the British government's share of Eurostar and little wonder too that loyal servants of corporate Britain, aka government ministers, are intent on catering to their every whim.

As with Royal Mail, the level of Eurostar's consistent corporate success is what whets the appetite of lurking predators.

It also gives the lie to the assertion that these public corporations need either alternative funding mechanisms or the mythical managerial expertise that supposedly resides within the private sector alone.

How anyone could remain addicted to this discredited fix after the reality of an economic crisis triggered by the private banking system baffles human reason.

Yet Alexander turns a blind eye to private-sector failure, insisting that the government will double its target for income from sales of publicly owned assets from £10bn to £20bn.

He can't be open and honest, admitting that this is what the government's corporate paymasters demand, so he resorts to the same old story about privatised assets being "better run, better managed."

Unfortunately, there is little parliamentary challenge to "private good, public bad" rhetoric, but there can be no effective alternative to the coalition's anti-working class policies without recognition of the vital need to extend public ownership.