The British National Health System (NHS) has backed away from a P3 deal with a Calgary consortium after realizing the proposed contract delivered poor value for money.
As part of the governments 2 billion initiative to reduce waiting times, the Albertan health care group Anglo-Canadian was chosen to carry out 30,000 operations a year in three surgery centres in London. But negotiations broke down as the NHS decided the proposed costs were unreasonably high.
This shows that even when cherry-picking the easiest cases, these foreign firms cant do it as cheaply as the NHS. The extra funds the government was going to pay them should be paid to NHS staff to do the work, says former health minister Frank Dobson.