In 2013 Kingston residents voted overwhelmingly against a proposed P3 hospital in their city. Despite the results, the Province signed a contract to use expensive private financing to build a new facility to replace Providence Care Mental Health.
Infrastructure Ontario CEO Bert Clark says the $8 billion premium the government spent to build public infrastructure under the public-private partnership model doesn’t tell the whole story.
He’s right, but likely not in the way he’s suggesting.
Remarkably Tuesday night Clark clung to the $14 billion in savings Infrastructure Ontario says is made possible through the privatized model of infrastructure development even though the Auditor General made it clear that figure is based on flawed comparisons and a lack of empirical data to support it. In today’s Toronto Star he downgraded it to $6 billion.
Infrastructure Ontario was not so brazen in its initial response to Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk’s recommendations. Most of their responses in the AG’s report make minor admissions and rely on “third party experts” to justify the rest.
As we stated Tuesday afternoon, just two errors in cost allocation identified by the AG is enough to suddenly swing 18 privatized projects into the public column, saving the public treasury $350 million. Did their “third party experts” notice these errors?
In yesterday’s Star Clark highlights the Union Station renovation and the subway extension to York University as counter examples of public procurement projects that have experienced cost overruns and delays.
By contrast Lysyk points out there were in fact eight P3 projects that were delayed longer than 60 days – the longest more than a year off schedule. For six of those projects the contractor did face financial consequences, but in two they did not. That’s eight out of 38.
OPSEU Diablogue 