The private finance initiative (PFI) is a way of creating "public–private partnerships" (PPPs) by funding public infrastructure projects with private capital. Developed initially by the Australian and United Kingdom governments, PFI and its variants have now been adopted in many countries as part of the wider neoliberal programme of privatisation and financialisation driven by an increased need for accountability and efficiency for public spending. It has been used extensively in Australia, the United Kingdom and Spain.
PFI has been controversial in the UK; the National Audit Office felt that it provided good value for money overall. However more recently the Parliamentary Treasury Select Committee found that ""PFI should be brought on balance sheet. The Treasury should remove any perverse incentives unrelated to value for money by ensuring that PFI is not used to circumvent departmental budget limits. It should also ask the OBR to include PFI liabilities in future assessments of the fiscal rules".
Read more about Private Finance Initiative: Overview, Development of PFI in Spain, Development of PFI in Other Countries
Famous quotes containing the words private, finance and/or initiative:
“A private sin is not so prejudicial in this world, as a public indecency.”
—Miguel De Cervantes (1547–1616)
“A bank is a confidence trick. If you put up the right signs, the wizards of finance themselves will come in and ask you to take their money.”
—Christina Stead (1902–1983)
“I am firmly opposed to the government entering into any business the major purpose of which is competition with our citizens ... for the Federal Government deliberately to go out to build up and expand ... a power and manufacturing business is to break down the initiative and enterprise of the American people; it is the destruction of equality of opportunity amongst our people, it is the negation of the ideals upon which our civilization has been based.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)