Self-serving

I'll post later on how the continued push for P3s makes for a stark contrast with how far too many Canadian governments and political parties treat spending which actually serves to benefit society at large rather than corporate benefactors. To whet your appetite, though, here's Toby Sanger on the Conference Board of Canada's latest infomercial posing as research:

The Conference Board of Canada published a report late last month, Dispelling the Myths, which purports to show that public-private partnerships (P3s) have delivered major efficiency gains for the public sector, a high degree of cost certainty, and greater transparency than conventional procurement.

While the report maintains it provides an impartial assessment of the benefits and drawbacks of using P3s, it is astoundingly superficial and biased in its analysis.

A major flaw with the report is that it takes the superficial “value for money” reports produced by P3 agencies at face value without questioning of their assumptions or methodologies for its claim that P3s have delivered efficiency gains.

In doing so, it also completely ignores recent reports by provincial auditors general that have been highly critical of the value for money methodologies used by these agencies.
...
Even though the report’s authors interviewed over 30 people for the report, they don’t appear to have interviewed one person from a public auditor’s office. With the exception of one academic, all the people interviewed were from P3 companies, P3 promotion agencies, government officials in this capacity, from agencies directly engaged in delivering P3s, or on the record in supporting P3s.
...
It should be no surprise that this Conference Board study was entirely funded by the federal and provincial P3 promotion agencies. The source of the funding shouldn’t necessarily disqualify the research, but in this case, it appears to be clearly crafted for the interests of its sponsors.