Privatisations: The last of the silver PRIVATISATION used to be something that happened to the commanding heights of the economy. British Airways, British Gas, British Petroleum, British Rail, British Steel, British Telecom - all went private under Conservative governments in the 1980s and 1990s, along with a few other, less patriotically named firms. Three decades later the coalition government is keen to revive one of Margaret Thatcher's most celebrated policies. But there is not much left to sell. Through the Shareholder Executive, a branch of the business department, the British government owns stakes in some 20 companies (excluding the Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Bank, which were in effect nationalised in 2008). These include some semi-commercial government bodies providing services such as export finance, a few remnants of dirigisme and a number of ancient institutions such as the Royal Mail and the Royal Mint. According to Mark Russell, head of the Shareholder Executive, as many as half could be sold. The main offerings at present are Urenco and the Royal Mail. The state's one-third stake in Urenco, which enriches uranium, is thought to be worth around £3 billion ($4.6 billion). A sale is possible now because the Dutch government, which owns another third, has dropped its veto. Royal Mail, now divested of its pension liabilities, is reckoned to be worth another £2.5 billion. Plasma Resources UK, which supplies blood plasma to the health service, and part of the Student Loan Company will be sold, too. If buyers snap those assets up, more sales could follow. The Land Registry, which records who owns British land, the Met Office, which makes weather predictions, and the Ordnance Survey, which produces maps, could all go on the block. Other possibilities include Channel 4, a public-service broadcaster owned wholly by the government, and the state's 40% stake in the Eurostar rail link, which became profitable for the first time last year. Unfortunately, the easy sales were made long ago: the remainder are not so easy to dispose of. Several firms sell mostly to the state, or perform unprofitable public-service tasks. Channel 4"s public-service broadcasting obligations make it worth little, points out Mark Oliver of Oliver & Olhbaum Associates, a media consultancy. It is not clear who the buyers will be (indeed, officials have yet to decide how to sell Urenco and Royal Mail). And some outfits are both lacking in commercial value and valued by the public. An attempt to sell the public's stake in NATS, which organises air-traffic control in Britain, was quietly abandoned because of fears of a public outcry. So was the planned sale of a big chunk of publicly-owned forest. Still, it is easy to see why there might be pressure to flog even unattractive assets. In the last financial year, the government managed to reduce headline borrowing despite a bigger current deficit partly thanks to the sale of 4G licences to mobile-phone companies for around £2.3 billion. If they find buyers, Urenco and Royal Mail could be this year's saviours.