Much has been made by politicians of the supposed benefits of public-private partnerships, but let me explain how these deals actually work;
Let’s say we want to build a hospital in Corby, because presently any accident or emergency patients, and maternity patients have to travel to Kettering. Let’s say the cost of actually building such a facility is around £6 million using public money. The government says that there simply isn’t the money to do this, but that they will create a public-private partnership called Corby NHS Trust to do this. The private member of the ‘partnership’ puts up the money, and has the hospital built. This means that the cost of building the hospital does not come out of public funding and thus does not appear on the exchequers books. But this money is then a debt owed to the private corporations who provided the finance and must be paid back to them over lets say 30 years, including interest. If the interest rate is only 2%, after 30 years £10.868 million will have to be repaid! Almost doubling the cost of building the hospital. The real figures and interest rates are probably much larger, but you get the idea.
Now if at the same time the services of that hospital are also privatised and therefore NOLONGER free at the point of service, the corporations who provided the finance will be charging those of us who can pay, and NOT serving those of us who can’t. They then stand to make not only the £4.868 million in profit from the government paying them back but also whatever amount of profit THEY decide to take after running costs.
The repayment schedules being talked about are up to 60 years, anyone with a calculator can see that this is a brilliant deal for the private investors, but a really crap deal for the British people, as we will be paying 3 or 4 times what it actually costs to build such hospitals, and be tied into paying for them for up to 60 years. Meanwhile assuming the privatisation of the NHS goes ahead, we will also be paying for the products of those hospitals, in terms of services we receive. It’s a Lose-Lose situation for the British people and a Win-win for the private corporations.
Now you see why millions of pounds are pouring into the Tory party coffers from private corporations, and how the millionaires who have usurped our government are laughing all the way to the bank!
