Mobile classroom teaches the 3Ps of public-private partnerships
TORONTO, ON. - A $1 million P3 (public-private partnership) campaign was launched today at Queen’s Park by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario Division. The campaign will take to the road via a mobile one-room schoolhouse with content that teaches the 3Ps of public-private partnerships.
Officially opening “The School of the 3Ps,” Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario President Sid Ryan said, “Privatization in all its forms is an attack on our public spaces and services. Our goal is to provide people with the information that isn’t found in the government announcements about these flawed ventures.”
The $1 million campaign will run for two years. The mobile schoolhouse will tour Ontario stopping at cities and towns experiencing difficulties with municipal and Liberal government-led privatization initiatives. It will also target members of the Liberal party in their home ridings.
“The math just doesn’t work,” Ryan said. “Private corporations wouldn’t be involved in these projects if there wasn’t money to be made. P3s create large profits for private businesses at public expense, and the public pays in many ways — user fees, higher borrowing rates, corporate profits, confidential deals, and cuts in service.”
Housed within the mobile unit will be displays offering capsulated information about the various forms of privatization, which have become popular with governments as they continue to abandon their responsibilities for the very services they were elected to provide. Displays demonstrate the high costs associated with P3s, and that they are a means to create profit for corporations at the expense of the taxpayer.
Featured prominently is, “Flawed, Failed or Abandoned” by Natalie Mehra. The report is a quick, but comprehensive look at 100 Canadian and international public-private partnerships. It destroys the overblown claims of P3 backers through clear examples of how privatization of public facilities and services undermines the public interest.
Visitors to the display are invited to view a short video presentation, and given an opportunity to submit their own concerns about privatization to their elected officials.
For more information, contact:
Sid Ryan
CUPE Ontario president
(416) 209-0066 (cell)
Sharon Young
CUPE communications
(416) 299-9739
(905) 213-2704 (cell)