European Services Strategy Unit

Excessive profits obtained by PPP companies and banks is again in the news. The first evidence on the scale of excessive PFI profits and the growth the secondary market was detailed in Global Auction of Public Assets by Dexter Whitfield and followed by a more detailed research in The £10bn Sale of Shares in PPP Companies: New source of profits for builders and banks, ESSU Research Paper No. 4, by Dexter Whitfield in January 2011. This details the news coverage and links to reports.

“‘Payment by results’ has become the new performance management mantra. It is intended to incentivise contractors, with payment conditional on the completion of agreed outputs or outcomes. There are currently two such payment and reward models: the social impact bond mechanism and phased incentive payments.” This article examines the implications of this approach, the growth of ‘social markets’, incentive payment contracts and explains why it is a high risk strategy; pages 22-23, in Critical Reflections: social and criminal justice in the first year of Coalition government, Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, March 2012.

See also Research note: The “social enterprise-payment by results-social impact bond” privatization trilogy?, Margot Young, Canadian Union of Public Employees, April 2012.

In February Dexter Whitfield gave lectures at the University of Sheffield (Department of Sociological Studies), Queens University, Belfast (School of Management), given evidence to the Public Accounts Committee, Western Australia State Government, and a presentation to the Canadian Union of Public Employees bi-annual research meeting.

An assessment of a business case update for the customer and support services outsourcing highlights the London Borough of Barnet’s approach – ignore real risks, miscalculate client costs, exaggerate savings, claim non-financial benefits that cannot be substantiated, inadequate equalities assessments and ignore the high failure rate PPP strategic partnership track record. The Council’s refusal to require services to be located in Barnet could lead to mass redundancies immediately after transfer.

A critical assessment of Compass's Plan B that reveals its shortcomings and need for a more radical and comprehensive socialist alternative, by Dexter Whitfield, Red Pepper Issue 182, Feb/Mar 2012.

A detailed analysis of the proposed transfer of the London Borough of Barnet’s Housing Service to Barnet Homes, the ALMO established in 2004. The Council truncated the options appraisal and business case into one process, limiting the options and pre-selecting the preferred option, and has led to a further deterioration in the quality of options appraisals and business cases in Barnet.

A detailed analysis of the proposed transfer of the London Borough of Barnet’s Housing Service to Barnet Homes, the ALMO established in 2004. The Council truncated the options appraisal and business case into one process, limiting the options and pre-selecting the preferred option, and has led to a further deterioration in the quality of options appraisals and business cases in Barnet.

The London Borough of Barnet plans to establish a LATC that requires Adult Services to generate up to 90% of the £0.7m annual profit. Yet the financial viability of Barnet Group Ltd (Yours Choice Barnet and Barnet Homes) is highly questionable. This report details the flawed appraisal process, the reasons for financial instability, governance and the potential impact on service users and staff.

In Place of Austerity, Restructuring the economy, state and public services, by Dexter Whitfield, Spokesman.

In the last thirty years public transport services throughout Europe have been subjected to various sorts of privatisation. Reforms introducing competition and market rules into public transport have challenged the public service ethos that these services operate under. The role of successive UK governments in these reforms is well understood and documented. However the role of EU law, policy and institutions in this area is not. The EU, and in particular the European Commission, have had a considerable impact on public policy choices concerning public transport in EU member states since the early 1990s. Those in the UK who seek to redirect public transport policy away from privatisation and toward truly ‘public’ alternatives are to be advanced need to be aware that EU policy will also need to be challenged. At the very least it is accepted that a full understanding of the EU’s role is necessary and dealing with these questions.

The European dimension to postal sector liberalisation is often overlooked as successive UK governments have pursued the liberalisation route for its universal postal service: the Royal Mail. Postal sectors in Europe, traditionally dominated by public sector monopolies, have been progressively opened up to increased competition courtesy of European Union (EU) directives, introduced since the mid-1990s as part of EU’s competition agenda and Single Market Programme. This long process of phased liberalisation has come to fruition recently with the last remnants of universal service providers’ protected services being abolished. On January 1st 2011 the Directive introducing ‘full’ liberalisation into European postal sectors was introduced the EU.

Soundings Winter 2010, Issue 46, pp99-111.

Outlines the elements of neoliberal transformation of the public sector and the criteria needed to assess the level of embeddedness and effectiveness of recent ‘reform’. It identifies key challenges beyond 2010 and proposes strategies to achieve progressive and systemic change.