Public Service, Private Profit

[Pax]

The Channel 4's Dispatches documentary series (more specifically Channel 4 News' economic correspondent Liam Halligan) are looking into the UK's controversial Private Finance Initiative tonight, 8-9pm.

Public Service, Private Profit

Channel 4 Monday 14 August, 8pm

In this edition of Dispatches, Channel 4 News Economics Correspondent Liam Halligan tackles the controversial Private Finance Initiative.

He reveals how the private funding of state schools and hospitals is draining hundreds of millions of pounds from frontline services, while creating a £4 billion-a-year industry and a new elite of publicly-unaccountable PFI professionals.

Under PFI, companies raise cash to fund public infrastructure projects, with the state signing long-term contracts. When it comes to 'delivering' schools and hospitals, New Labour claims PFI is 'the only game in town'.

It certainly looks a win-win policy for Chancellor Gordon Brown. He can claim to be 'prudent' – because most PFI borrowing is off the government's books. And ministers can regularly be seen opening shiny new public buildings.

During a 6-month investigation, Halligan visits some of the UK's 700 PFI projects. He secures exclusive testimony – with numerous public officials speaking out for the first time – about 'hidden costs' and 'sweated contracts'. And the film reveals Sir John Bourn, the Auditor General's, concerns about PFI.

Dispatches: Public Service, Private Profit reveals how the ownership of the HQ of a leading government department has been quietly transferred, by one of the UK's biggest banks, to an overseas tax haven.

It reveals how a little-known investment company is now the biggest owner of UK schools and hospitals after the state – responsible for 100,000 pupils and 13,000 hospital beds.

The film also reveals how PFI locks us into 30-year contracts with companies then charging huge mark-ups for basic maintenance. Changing a light switch in one flagship PFI hospital costs hundreds of pounds.

Halligan meets an exasperated Head Teacher, constantly battling to get a PFI company to honour its contract. 'PFI has made students depressed at times – when they've seen the lack of interest in the building and poor quality of work. Staff have resigned over it. PFI is threatening this school'.

Dispatches then unveils a multi-billion pound market in which public sector projects are being traded as commodities in the City of London. This 'secondary market' is generating huge profits.

Since 1997, New Labour has signed PFI deals worth £43 billion – leaving taxpayers with a £150 billion bill over 25 years. And, in his last budget, Brown announced another £26 billion of new PFI projects.

Also see the pie thread Public-Private Partnerships

And some articles on these public private partnerships Our very own Enron?
a-scandal-of-secrecy-and-collusion/.
bleeding-us-dry

…. This refinancing represents just part of the difference between the terms on which the government can borrow and the terms on which private companies can borrow. Governments are regarded by lenders as a safer bet than corporations. PFI will always offer worse value for money than public funding because the debt required to support it costs more….

road-hogs

…. And because, for any company, profits must come before people, many of these projects offer far worse services than their publicly funded equivalents. Beds are crammed together in hospitals which look and feel like giant morgues; operating theatres are flooded with sewage; children try to study in permanent building sites; underpaid prison guards sign off sick and look for work elsewhere. The experiment keeps failing, but the government keeps repeating it…..

exploitation-on-tap
a-challenge-to-the-chancellor
private-affluence-public-rip-off
private-finance-keep-out

[FakeViking]

Oh! come on! How dare you question the PD economic model? Ask Tom Parlon, he'll tell you that that white horse is actually green

[Pax]

Oh! come on! How dare you question the PD economic model? Ask Tom Parlon, he'll tell you that that white horse is actually green

I...see.....a...White Horse!!!

It was a superb programme though which highlighted new areas of the ppp scam that I was unaware of - such as the legal tax evasion.

Basically because of their very nature, PPPs are the biggest rip-off of tax payers money in the history of the modern state. Schools, hospitals and roads are being built (and run) to shoddy standards for a multitude of what they should cost while frontline public services are starved of necessary funds. Some of the overspend figures were just truly staggering.

Anyway it should be available online at some point
http://isohunt.com/torrents.php?ihq=dispatches