CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador President Wayne Lucas is calling on the Ball Government to reconsider using a public private partnership (P3) to finance the construction of a long-term care home in Corner Brook, announced today.

“We’re glad to hear that the provincial government is responding to the needs of Corner Brook residents. However, we would caution the government to consider the perils of using P3s to finance this facility,” states Wayne Lucas, CUPE NL president. “They are using a finance model that is a proven failure and will cost taxpayers millions more than expected.”

“It’s like using a credit card to pay for it,” says Lucas. “Let’s start this project the right way. Let’s keep the long-term care home publicly financed, owned and operated.”

“I just heard Premier Ball use the word ‘leased’ and that would send a shudder down the backs of taxpayers in Nova Scotia! They just found out what a poor decision their Liberal government made building P3 schools using a so-called public private partnership. Now they’re buying back leases for schools that they should have owned outright from the beginning,” says Lucas. 

“Time and time again provincial governments are forced to admit they were wrong to use public private partnerships to construct health care facilities, costing taxpayers billions of dollars more than they would spend if those hospitals were publicly owned and constructed.”

“Auditors, researchers and journalists across Canada continue to report on P3 failures and the unnecessary waste of taxpayers money, yet here we are in Newfoundland and Labrador about to embark on another foreseeable failure,” says Lucas. “Put our health care dollars into the public health care system, not into construction cost overruns and the pockets of private companies – who may not even be from our province.”