//Someone else harking back to the 70’s.//
The reason humans have been infinitely more successful than any other species is down to one thing – the ability of the present generation to record its experiences and leave them for their descendants to learn from and build on. Other species are largely limited to learning what can be passed on from parent to offspring at the time of their upbringing.
Governments do not do particularly well at running commercial businesses. They don’t do very well at running public services either, but sometimes there is no practical choice. What Tora refers to, from the 70s which you suggest he is harking back to, is a period where successive governments used to run what are now commercial enterprises. Whilst some of these enterprises are not as good as they might be, there is no doubt that the consumer is now in a far better place overall when he wants their products and services than he was fifty years ago when they were State controlled. That’s why we must live and learn because doing the same things when experience shows that they are manifestly without merit is somewhat silly.
//Labour is back in the centre ground of British politics..//
Depends largely where you place your “centre”.