More public rescues for more private finance failures.docx

1、More public rescues for more private finance failuresMore public rescues for more private finance failures- a critique of the EC Communication on PPPsDavid Hall d.j.hallgre.ac.uk March 2010A report commissioned by the European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU) www.epsu.org Preface by EPSU 2

2、1. Introduction 42. Assessing PPPs 42.1 Unbalanced and weak arguments 42.2 PPPs: consuming public finance 52.2.1 Transport in UK 62.2.2 PPPs in central and eastern Europe 63. Political and financial problems with PPPs 74. State rescues for PPPs 74.1 EU and Government support 74.2 International insti

3、tutions lobby for PPPs 84.3 Public sector guarantees, subsidies and loans 9Table 1 EU: public assistance to PPPs 94.3.2 EIB: public interest rates for private companies 94.3.3 Financial engineering to channel public money to private contractors 94.4 The Key actions of the Communication 104.5 IMF war

4、nings ignored 115. The role of PPPs in the economic strategy of Europe 2020 115.1 Economic and fiscal strategy 115.2 Private sector failures in infrastructure investment 126. Annex: Innovative financing instruments 136.1 The cost to public authorities in Europe and the USA 136.2 Greek debt swaps 136

5、.3 Financial havoc for European municipalities 136.4 USA: public authorities, bribes, and innovative financial instruments 147. Selected bibliography 158. Notes 16Preface by EPSUThe European Commission has over many years promoted Public-Private Partnerships. The Commission sees these as an efficien

6、t tool to spend public funding. With the financial crisis in full swing funding for PPPs dried up in 2008 and early 2009. PPPs ran into difficulties. To support private business the European Commission published a Communication “Developing Public Private Partnerships” in November 2009. It is a first

7、 class propaganda piece for private business rather than a balanced account of risk and advantages of public private partnerships. The risks of PPPs were highlighted when Aquiris, a subsidiary of French multinational Veolia Water, charged with treating waste water in Brussels, home of the European C

8、ommission, stopped doing so, 8 December 2009. Untreated water of 1.1 million citizens polluted the river Zenne during 10 days when the company was forced to start up operations again. Research of Corporate Europe Observatory revealed how the company was seeking more money of public authorities, coul

9、d not fulfill its contract and had basically lied about its technology in its response to the tender. But more worrying is that Brussels is now lumbered with the contract. Pulling out will be extremely costly. CEO concludes its research:“Behind these spectacular events is the story of how a private

10、corporation used public money to develop a new technology which will be sold elsewhere for the companys sole profit (Veolia Water used the Aquiris case extensively in its marketing, because a safe and more environmentally-friendly method to dispose of wastewater sludge is much in demand at the momen

11、t). Unfortunately this proved to be a riskier bet than originally envisaged, and the two ”partners” of the costliest water Public Private Partnership (PPP) in Belgium now face mountains of sludge waiting to be treated, piles of debt and a brand new plant which has still not been shown as up to the j

12、ob.”When we learned that the forthcoming EU 2020 strategy would again seek to promote PPPs EPSU decided to ask Public Services International Research Unit to comment on the European Commissions proposals in the earlier mentioned Communication. PSIRU has researched and published reports on PPPs in Eu

13、rope and internationally over the last decade, carries out international studies like the EU-funded 1.5million Watertime project, and provides evidence and advice to public authorities and elected representatives at all levels.This report makes clear that PPPs suck up public funding, increase risks

14、to public finance and in general are a bad way to spend tax payers money. It also reveals the extent to which DG Internal Market is pursuing an ideological course to suit its core constituency: private business. And now BusinessEurope, the European organization for big corporations, wants more corpo

15、rate welfare. It published its call for more public money for big business on 15 March 2010 in a report Combining fiscal consolidation with sustainable growth: A European action plan. It is a full scale attack on public service workers, on public pensions and health care. But guess what BusinessEuro

16、pe argues that private business should receive funding to run your health service, child care, drinking water and all other public services. And of course treat your waste water: one of the authors is a key Veolia representative. BusinessEurope does not shy away to push its agenda on your Ministers

17、for Finance which met 16 March 2010 arguing that if they are not listened to Europe will grind to a halt. And to do so it propagates myths on PPPs. This new report of PSIRU debunks these myths. Our conclusion is that the European Commission does not promote the public interest when coming out in for

18、ce in support of PPPs. It should have a far more critical and balanced attitude on how private business operates PPPs. This balance can possibly only be restored if public procurement and PPPs are moved to the European Commissions DG which deals with consumer protection. After all, with the Procurem

19、ent directives in place, it is a matter of protecting the interests of citizens over those of capital.But you might disagree. You might have comments on the report. You might have done research that contradicts the findings. Please inform us. But equally, if you know of cases that confirm what is ar

20、gued in the report please do not hesitate to send it to us. It will assist the workers in public and private companies and institutions delivering public services to citizens every day in often difficult and dangerous circumstances. Because in the end our members and you as tax payer have to share t

21、he burden of faulty public-private partnerships.Jan Willem GoudriaanEPSU Deputy General Secretary epsuepsu.org1. IntroductionIn November 2009 the EC published a Communication on Developing Public Private Partnerships. The paper does not offer a balanced assessment of experience with PPPs, or trends

22、in PPPs in Europe. In particular, it does not address the way that PPPs reduce the resources available for public services by absorbing a higher proportion of spending. The main purpose of the paper is rather a review of various policy instruments of the EU, focussed on the single overriding questio

23、n of how these can be used to subsidise and create more PPPs than would otherwise be the case. This report reviews and criticises the Communication in a number of respects:- Its inadequate analysis of existing experience- Its unbalanced attempt to maximise the use of public finance and public instit

24、utions to support PPPs, including in particular it s use of innovative financial instruments- The emptiness of the role of PPPs in the 2020 economic strategy- The wider problems of public authorities using innovative financial instruments This critique follows a number of other PSIRU reports on PPPs

25、, which are listed in the bibliography at the end of this paper.2. Assessing PPPs2.1 Unbalanced and weak argumentsThe section on the case for PPPs is too superficial and one-sided. As the title suggests, it only sets out arguments in favour of PPPs, it does not offer a balanced assessment. A recent

26、PSIRU paper set out an analysis of the risks and impact of PPPs, including a number of examples. The present Communication does not mention any such cases, (although 7 years ago, a Commission briefing on PPPs did acknowledge these risks, and gave examples). These problem cases have continued to incr

27、ease. The paper claims that PPPs are mainly on-time and on-budget, but fails to observe that this is because they are based on turnkey contracts, which require successful completion before payments are made - but at a cost which is 25% higher than normal procurement. It claims PPPs provide better va

28、lue for money, and quotes the results of a PPIAF study on water and energy which found evidence of higher efficiency - but (a) it fails to note that the PPIAF study found no evidence at all of increased investment or lower prices, so none of the benefits of any efficiency gains go to the public sect

29、or, they only increase profits (b) the PPIAF study is only one amongst many, the great majority of which find no significant differences in efficiency between public and private sectors. This is extremely damaging for the case for PPPs: as the IMF has observed, since their cost of capital is always

30、higher, they would have to make major efficiency gains in operations to even match the public sector option. The claim that they spread the cost over the lifetime of an asset is trivial - this is the effect of any borrowing by governments, not only through PPPs. The claim about risk-sharing also nee

31、ds more hard evidence rather than an assertion - the many cases where services have been cut or taxes increased must be examined as part of a full assessment. The paper provides no evidence for its claim for innovation by PPPs, yet there is fresh evidence confirming that the private sector spends li

32、ttle or nothing on R&D in crucial sectors such as electricity (see below). The 2020 economic strategy paper also acknowledges that R&D spending in Europe is too low compared with Japan and the USA “mainly as a result of lower levels of private investment” The final two points - that the private sector gets a central role in planning infrastructure, and gains experience that is useful for winning projects overseas - are true, but these are benefits to the private sector, not to the public interest. There is clear evidence, for e