[m419]

Well kind of. Cable and Wireless used to be publicly owned too, between 1940's and 1982, Cable and Wireless was goverment owned.

The goverment in 1980's and 90's didn't expect so much competition, they expected as this:

Greater London 1996:

Telecoms:
BT
Cable London
Videotron
Mercury Communications
Telewest Communications
Cable Corp
Colt
Energis
Worldcom
IPM Communications(Interphone payphones)
New World Payphones
UK Cellnet
Vodafone/Vodac
Mercury Personal Communications
Hutchison Telecoms(Orange)


Utilities:
London Electricity
British Gas(Now National Grid Gas, it was publicly owned till 1997)
Eastern Electricity(Now EDF) Serving North of Middlesex
Thames Water
Three Valleys Water

And Greater London in 2008:

Telecoms:
BT
Virgin Media/NTL Telewest Business
Cable and Wireless(Mercury&Energis)
Thus/Your Communications
Colt
Verizon(Formerly Worldcom)
Infolines Public Networks(Was IPM Comms)
Opal Telecom/Carphone/TalkTalk
Spacetel
Fibreway
Spectrum Interactive(New World Payphones)
T-Mobile UK
Vodafone UK
Orange Personal Communications
Hutchison 3G UK
O2 UK
And lots more............

Utilities:
Thames Water
EDF Energy(Electricity)
National Grid Gas(Transco)
Three Valleys Water

And Greater London in 1993:

Telecoms:
BT
Mercury Communications
Mercury Personal Communications
Mercury Communications Payphones(IPM now Infolines)
Vodafone/Vodac
UK Cellnet
Cable London (Now Virgin Media/Telewest)
Videotron (Now Virgin Media/NTL)
Colt
Rabbit

Utilities:
Thames Water
British Gas
Three Valleys water
London Electricity
Eastern Electricity

So you see how it changes, its mostly the same companies around and some appear and disappear soon after because they have been gobbled up by a rival. This could be the case with H20.