[Greens-Media] The Government ’s obsession with Public Private Partnerships will be at the expense of good quality public education

[Amanda.Sharp at parliament.vic.gov.au]

27 September 2007


The Government’s obsession with Public Private Partnerships will be at the
expense of good quality public education

Greens MLC Sue Pennicuik has criticised the State Government’s plans to
have new school buildings and other facilities effectively privatised under
a Public Private Partnership scheme (PPPs).

"Claims that PPPs represent value for money are not borne out by experience
in the UK. PPPs entail greater costs to taxpayers over the long term than
the traditional means of providing public infrastructure. The financial
impact of PPPs will be to shift debt into ever increasing recurrent
payments to private consortiums who are more interested in profit than in
meeting the needs of students.

"School communities will lose control of their facilities and will be
forced to pay a significant cost for their use out of their annual budgets.
Several recent academic studies have shown PPP’s to be an expensive way of
funding public infrastructure, and, clearly they provide massive windfall
profits for business consortiums at taxpayers’ expense”, she said

“Rather than going down the PPP road, the solution to public school
infrastructure problems is to bring education spending levels in Victoria
up to (or higher than) other states. Mr Brumby should be committing to
increased funding and resourcing of our public education system, including
pre-school education.

‘The Brumby government should honestly assess their value to the public -
in the short and long term - before even considering their suitability for
schools,” said Ms Pennicuik.


For further information:  Sue Pennicuik  0407 000 270





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