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Finance Bill

The fact that people make a profit out of something does not mean that they are not absorbing risk. It means that they have successfully managed it and moved it on. The point is whether, if something goes wrong, the risk resides with the public sector. In many PFIs in the health service and in education, the risk clearly rests with the public sector because it cannot turn around if the PFI goes wrong and say, ““That’s all right, we’ll just close the hospital? or, ““We’ll close the school.? Those public facilities are important and would have to be kept going. The private sector knows that when it enters into negotiations with the Government. When I was in the Cabinet, I remember vetoing PFI schemes for hospitals in Wales because I believed that it was cheaper to pay for them out of the long bond market or through taxation. That is what we mainly did on my watch.