Many municipalities are arguing that the P3 model is the only way for communities to get new arenas, libraries, and hospitals; ignoring the huge increase in costs and the loss of the municipal control over its own services.

Ask your municipal candidates and school board trustees:

1. Do you support public control and accountability of public schools, including public ownership and operation?

Canada’s most famous disaster with P3 schools took place in Nova Scotia from 1997 to 1999.  A Liberal government decreed that all new schools would be P3 schools.  By 1999 the province had elected a Progressive Conservative government that cancelled the scheme as totally unaffordable.  The provincial auditor found that the thirty-eight P3 schools already built had cost $32 million more than the traditional public investment approach.  Moreover, the schools were plagued with problems from leaky roofs, unfinished playgrounds, high costs for after school use, and even a demand for a share of chocolate bar sales.

2. Do you support publicly-administered not-for-profit health care, including public ownership, operation and accountability of new hospital facilities?

Here’s what happens when publicly-delivered public services are handed over to private profit-seeking corporations:

William Osler Health Centre in Brampton is a P3 deal that McGuinty promised to cancel, but the deal went ahead anyway.  The hospital construction was over a year late, the hospital size is smaller than planned with fewer beds and it ran over budget by $174 million.  Ontario’s crumbling infrastructure could certainly use another $174 million instead of taxpayers’ money increasing the profit margins for a corporation.

It has been proven time and time again that privatizing public services won’t make them more efficient or cheaper.  Costs will go up and quality will go down.  User fees will increase.