Warning message

Please note that this page is from our archives. There may be more up-to-date content about this topic on our website. Use our search engine to find out.

The Labour government’s commitment to the private finance initiative (British for public private partnerships) over the past decade will cost taxpayers £170 billion from now to 2032, says a Nov. 27, 2007, Guardian article.

A British Treasury report produced by MPs and released this week shows that Prime Minister Gordon Brown has committed future governments to pay back £170 billion to banks, investors and private entrepreneurs for more than 800 schemes for new hospitals, schools and prisons.

The disclosure comes after a spate of criticisms of PFI schemes, from Norwich and Norfolk hospital which proved to be too small to meet demands, to consortiums making huge profits from refinancing PFI deals, the most notable being Fazakerly prison near Liverpool where a consortium got virtually all their money back by refinancing the scheme.