|
18 |
|
What future for Public Services? |
|
Private Finance Initiative and Public Private Partnerships |
|
A new report from the Sheffield based Centre for Public Services investigates the impact of the growing trend of using Private Finance Initiatives (PFI) and Public Private Partnerships (PPP) to fund public services. |
|
What future for public services? charts the history of PFI from their Conservative origins to the Labour government�s use of such projects. The report explains the alleged rationale behind these initiatives before providing a comprehensive series of points that are highly critical of them. |
|
An entire section of the report highlights twenty-five reasons to oppose PFI. They range from the expense of such projects, many of which cost more than publicly financed ones, to their lack of democratic accountability. |
|
Drawing on the Centre�s research on PFI/PPPs over the last seven years, the report also details the overlapping business interests of the major companies which are at the core of the PFI industry (see section). |
|
What future for public services? provides a thorough critical evaluation of the seismic shifts which are slowly altering the way in which the nation�s public services are funded, whilst providing a set of alternatives to these projects. |
|
The report is only available on the Centre�s website: |
|
A Systems View of �Economic Fundamentals� |
|
Bruce Buchanan |
|
When we as citizens, taxpayers, wage earners, investors and parents hear that, despite stock market turmoil, the � fundamentals are sound�, we have no little stake in knowing exactly what this means. What are the criteria being used to make the assessment that economic fundamentals are �healthy�? |
|
We know what a pronouncement of good health would mean coming from a competent physician. It would mean that evidence indicated all systems within the normal range and trending to remain so. |
|
If we ask an engineer whether it is feasible to build a dam in a certain location we would expect that his answer would cover all the bases, that he or she would not approve a plan in which, while the dam itself is sound, the subsoil may not be. |
|
So it is a fair question to ask: What are the criteria, in practice, on which the diagnosis of a �healthy economy� rests? Is there some incentive for those who make such statements to be self-serving? Is the usual time horizon of politics and business (perhaps 2 to 6 years, or less) important in answering this question? Can citizens expect the same standards of objectivity and probity from economists as they have come to expect from physicians, engineers, and other professionals? |
|
Probably few people have such expectations of such reliability in economic forecasts. Many also believe that truly professional or objective standards are not possible in relation to economic studies, and what we have is the best that can be done. |
|
Conventional criteria for a healthy economy (e.g., those applied by �value investors� as opposed to �day traders�) perhaps include prospects for continuing trade and business activity, high levels of stable employment (which also provide for consumer purchasing power), growing markets, increasing wealth, social stability, favourable returns on investments, and so on. (The reader can add to this list.) |
|
The list of criteria can also be expanded by taking into account other factors, also well known, which bear upon long-term sustainability of an economy and society. |