Comments on: From PFI to privatisation, our national accounting rules encourage daft decisions. It’s time to change them. https://neweconomics.opendemocracy.net/pfi-privatisation-national-accounting-rules-encourage-destructive-decisions-time-change/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=pfi-privatisation-national-accounting-rules-encourage-destructive-decisions-time-change Tue, 30 Oct 2018 06:27:00 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.3.8 By: Andrew Crow https://neweconomics.opendemocracy.net/pfi-privatisation-national-accounting-rules-encourage-destructive-decisions-time-change/#comment-1498 Tue, 30 Oct 2018 06:27:00 +0000 https://www.opendemocracy.net/neweconomics/?p=2222#comment-1498 This is just another case where the blame is attached to the EU when in reality it is our government doing it to our population.

They’ve been doing it for four decades with the blessing of some of the most eminent economists. Thieving, lying bastards, one and all. It’s the only rational conclusion to explain such bizarre behaviour.

]]> By: Andrew Crow https://neweconomics.opendemocracy.net/pfi-privatisation-national-accounting-rules-encourage-destructive-decisions-time-change/#comment-1497 Tue, 30 Oct 2018 06:21:00 +0000 https://www.opendemocracy.net/neweconomics/?p=2222#comment-1497 True, I think.

]]> By: NeilM639 https://neweconomics.opendemocracy.net/pfi-privatisation-national-accounting-rules-encourage-destructive-decisions-time-change/#comment-965 Thu, 25 Jan 2018 12:06:00 +0000 https://www.opendemocracy.net/neweconomics/?p=2222#comment-965 Tories are not interested in anything from which they cannot enrich themselves at public expense.

]]> By: Jeremy Fox https://neweconomics.opendemocracy.net/pfi-privatisation-national-accounting-rules-encourage-destructive-decisions-time-change/#comment-963 Thu, 18 Jan 2018 15:03:00 +0000 https://www.opendemocracy.net/neweconomics/?p=2222#comment-963 Yes. I hope this is widely circulated; but suspect that even if the whole Tory cabinet were forced to read it, the Treasury’s bizarre accounting practices would go on as before – and for the reason that Laurie suggests: ideology, doubtless supported in no small measure by the cosy relationship between government and big business. Much has already been written about the sheer economic and financial lunacy of PFIs (at least for the taxpayer). And yet we hear the same tired arguments in favour of the policy: the private sector is more efficient, can do things cheaper and so on – because it’s subject to market discipline through competition. Except that, for the most part, it isn’t. There may be a limited (in practice very limited) element of private sector competition during the tendering process for PFI or outsourcing contracts. Once they have been awarded, however, competition and market discipline become irrelevant. A 30-year contract to build and run a hospital is effectively competition-free for…..30 years; and the happy contractor’s only concern, therefore, is to maximise profits from the service, which it invariably does by minimising the quality of provision.

Many – perhaps most of us – have experience of this craziness. Herewith a simple local example. Where I live, rubbish collection has been outsourced. On collection day, after the garbage truck has trundled off, our street is littered with fallen rubbish, and the bins are usually left either blocking the pavement (a nightmare for the disabled or parents with prams), or left just inside entrance gates as a perfect signal to burglars that no one is at home. It would take a little extra time and care to deal with both issues. But time and care cost money: public service sacrificed on the anvil of private gain.

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