There are a number of purported advantages of public-private partnerships over conventional procurement contracts. Most of them, however, do not withstand a close examination.

 

Value for money?

Most practitioners agree that value for money should be the driving factor in any decision to use a PPP. However experience shows that this is rarely the case. There is no standard definition of value for money, and the methods for assessing it are subjective and open to manipulation.
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Efficiency through competition?

In practice, due to their complexity only a few companies can afford to bid for PPPs and there has therefore often been a lack of competition, resulting in increased costs that may have wiped out the ‘value for money’ justifications for using PPPs in the first place.
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Efficiency through meeting deadlines?

Part of the potential efficiency of infrastructure projects consists of completing the construction on time and on budget. Claims that public-private partnerships offer particular advantages in this regard are mostly unfounded.
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Efficiency through risk transfer?

In theory, risks in PPPs are transferred to the party most able to limit and control them. In practice, however, whenever the private sector takes on risk, it expects a considerable profit for doing so.
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