Should

16-06-2012 07:50PM #1

Should all state provided service be privatized, education, health care, etc.
Any organization could tender for the work, would not matte if they were a for profit company, a charity, or a group of employees the only criteria would be that they meet the standards required and that they were the cheapest. The role of the government would be to set the standards required and to pay for the services. Such a system would dramatically reduce the amount of public services employees and thus the problem of public services pensions.

Or do you thing that people have the right to have philosophical objection to services like education being provided by a FOR PROFIT provider.

ardmacha · 16-06-2012 07:54PM

Such a system would dramatically reduce the amount of public services employees and thus the problem of public services pensions.

You can make a case that privatised services would be more efficient. However, the "saving" on pensions often arises because the privatised services have no proper pensions at all. People without pensions often fall back on taxpayer resources when they are older.

16-06-2012 08:10PM

One of the criteria could be that there has to be a pension provision for the employees of the successful tendering company.

itzme · 16-06-2012 08:13PM

mariaalice wrote: »

Should all state provided service be privatized, education, health care, etc.
Any organization could tender for the work, would not matte if they were a for profit company, a charity, or a group of employees the only criteria would be that they meet the standards required and that they were the cheapest. The role of the government would be to set the standards required and to pay for the services. Such a system would dramatically reduce the amount of public services employees and thus the problem of public services pensions.

Or do you thing that people have the right to have philosophical objection to services like education being provided by a FOR PROFIT provider.

There really does need to be a move away from this simplistic argument of Public sector workers = bad and Private sector workers = good and pirvate sector can't do public service jobs.
There are plenty of examples where privatising did not bring any benefit (eircom, rail services in uk), where private sector has been terrible (banks, developers..) and where the public sector has been terrible (some of HSE, some regulators...)
My own personal view is that there are some services in the public sector which should not be run to make profit. That does not mean that they should be intentionally run at a loss. Once you bring in a profit based attitude to some of the areas of education and health you are putting the citizen second to money. Again this is not a defense of the current waste but OPs statement is oversimplifying the argument and gets us nowhere.

16-06-2012 08:23PM

I work for a charity that is largely funded by a government department plus a small amount of fund raising.

I notice a tendency in myself to recoiled in horror at the thought of say residential care for venerable children being provided by a for profit organization, yet I think that for profit nursing homes ( vetted by HIQA ) are acceptable for venerable older people. That is why I put up the thread.

itzme · 16-06-2012 08:34PM

mariaalice wrote: »

Should all state provided service be privatized, education, health care, etc.

This was where my emphasis on over simplification was based on.
There will always be a need for state employees and private employees in a capitalist country. So in answer to question, no all state provided services should not be privatised.

Finnbar01 · 16-06-2012 09:00PM

Why not?

Why do people think we cannot have education, health etc unless we have a large government bureaucracy overseen those things?

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 16-06-2012 09:03PM

mariaalice wrote: »

Should all state provided service be privatized, education, health care, etc.
Any organization could tender for the work, would not matte if they were a for profit company, a charity, or a group of employees the only criteria would be that they meet the standards required and that they were the cheapest. The role of the government would be to set the standards required and to pay for the services. Such a system would dramatically reduce the amount of public services employees and thus the problem of public services pensions.

Or do you thing that people have the right to have philosophical objection to services like education being provided by a FOR PROFIT provider.

Absofukinglutely not.

As soon as any given child, elderly or sick patient be deemed unprofitbale they will be given a pat on the head and told to **** off to the nearest grave or prison cell.

itzme · 16-06-2012 09:09PM

Finnbar01 wrote: »

Why not?

Why do people think we cannot have education, health etc unless we have a large government bureaucracy overseen those things?

Can you point me to one country that has NO state provided services?
That is what the OP was proposing, no state provided services not the privatisation of some.

Markcheese · 16-06-2012 09:22PM

Some things definitely , all form processing on a large scale, motor tax , medical card even rent allowance ect. Dept of ag do it a lot, even though they're way over staffed .
Schools , probably not.... Can't see what benefit it would bring.... They do with a lot of tightening up... But...
Personaly I'd tender out operating theatres and scanner ect. In their down time... Sweat em 24 hours a day.... I reckon bons secours ect. could run most of our public hospitals cheaper and More efficiently than the current system....

I'd privatise TD's and heads of dept in civil service too ... Seriously ...... Make them self-employed... Responsible for their own pensions...severance pay and expenses ect .....

sarumite · 16-06-2012 09:30PM

itzme wrote: »

Can you point me to one country that has NO state provided services?
That is what the OP was proposing, no state provided services not the privatisation of some.

If they hires a private company to provide a service, is it not in effect providing a service. Just because the government provides welfare assistance, doesn't necessarily meant it has to be the one doing the paperwork. Many companies outsource their payroll for example.

I don't agree with the 100% outsourcing of government labour, however I do believe there are areas where the government currently is doing work that it shouldn't necessarily be doing. I think outsourcing would allow the government greater flexibility in staffing levels than it currently has at the moment where redundant positions must be retained. However Ireland is very much a fiscally-left leaning country so I don't see things changing.

ardmacha · 16-06-2012 09:52PM

In some ways we have the worst of both worlds. Many top hospitals and universities in the world are run as not for profit organisations, with clear missions and strong governance. Here, the governing bodies of these type of places are packed with good ol' boys and county councillors, so that their management can pillage them, while still subject to arbitrary rules originating in the civil service.

opti0nal · 16-06-2012 10:03PM

ardmacha wrote: »

However, the "saving" on pensions often arises because the privatised services have no proper pensions at all. People without pensions often fall back on taxpayer resources when they are older.

Not a problem if the outsourcer exploits cheap labour in or from developing countries.

I think we should definitely privitise the banks.

KyussBishop · 16-06-2012 10:20PM

Some of the Libertarian threads provide good discussions of the benefits/pitfalls of public vs private in various areas like banking/education, as Libertarians at-heart oppose most government intervention in anything (thus favour privatization of most sectors).

When you start to examine the implications of a privatized system in some essential areas like education though, you see that it completely changes the dynamics of the system in such vast way, in ways that are not superficially obvious when first examining private vs public arguments.

For instance, if you fully privatize education, that means schools have to enact fees and parents have to pay directly to put their children through school, so you effectively remove the long-held guarantee of education for all.

This depends on how you set that up though, as you could still maintain welfare vouchers for schooling, for the most needy; then, however, you have a very regressive system where school fees do not scale based on income (taxation i.e. a public system, however, is progressive as it does scale on income).

What that means, is that the less money you earn, the greater a percentage of your earnings you pay to put your child through school (because school fees don't scale with earnings), which is a completely regressive system that is arguably unfair on less well off families.

So, this (as a basic example; one I've much debated on the Political Theory forum) shows that the public vs private arguments for various sectors is far more complicated than it superficially appears, and you have to very carefully examine the implications of privatization in every sector, as it has serious ramifications which are not immediately obvious.

secretambition · 16-06-2012 10:30PM

Imagine Ryanair style health care. Some things just should not be done with profit as the sole motive, which would inevitably be the case in the private sector.

Markcheese · 17-06-2012 06:17AM

Ryanair style health care would be great.,,, more routes, more choice, more people using it ,all at far lower cost ..... Brand new equipment....... And run by a hand full of people ( what do the dept of health do ) reacting quicky.
Admittedly I wouldn't put Michael o Leary in charge of overall health care provision and planning.....he was advocating the American system, where the health care spend is higher in total per person overall( hospitals, doctors pharmacies) but the health outcomes are actually worse per head ... Fine if yr rich with good insurance ... not great on low to average income..

itzme · 17-06-2012 09:25AM

sarumite wrote: »

If they hires a private company to provide a service, is it not in effect providing a service. Just because the government provides welfare assistance, doesn't necessarily meant it has to be the one doing the paperwork. Many companies outsource their payroll for example.

I don't agree with the 100% outsourcing of government labour, however I do believe there are areas where the government currently is doing work that it shouldn't necessarily be doing. I think outsourcing would allow the government greater flexibility in staffing levels than it currently has at the moment where redundant positions must be retained. However Ireland is very much a fiscally-left leaning country so I don't see things changing.

I think you've mis-interpreted me, I'm all for debating privatising certain areas of the public sector. This is not what the OP was asking though, which is why my two posts were dismissive of the OP question as it was in IMO an overly simplistic question which implied the usual Public = bad, Private = good. It seems you agree with me that privatising the whole public sector is a silly idea.

On the rest of your post, I agree there are some areas that the government should look at alternatives like outsourcing. However, I often find the volume of this is overstated. Also sometimes the knock on effects as Kyussbishop has said are not thought of. Could you say which area's you think we should privatise, I assume (and could be wrong) you mean payroll and areas like that?

Markcheese · 17-06-2012 01:23PM

Just a couple of examples...
Nct testing privately run , no great drama, testing available saturdays and weekends ,hasn't rocketed in price and a much bigger volume of tests than when it started....
Ptrb ( private tenancies registration board ) state run , slow, expensive, ineffective and will answer the phone 1 morning a week ... Maybe....,
You wouldn't privatise the Gardai or the army or policy making but there's loads of things that could be and probably should be privatised and tendered for.....chief in that would be in health providing and county councils,

secretambition · 17-06-2012 03:48PM

Markcheese wrote: »

Ryanair style health care would be great.,,, more routes, more choice, more people using it ,all at far lower cost ..... Brand new equipment....... And run by a hand full of people ( what do the dept of health do ) reacting quicky.
Admittedly I wouldn't put Michael o Leary in charge of overall health care provision and planning.....he was advocating the American system, where the health care spend is higher in total per person overall( hospitals, doctors pharmacies) but the health outcomes are actually worse per head ... Fine if yr rich with good insurance ... not great on low to average income..

More routes and more choice as long as you're profitable. Ryanair don't fly places to make a loss. Great for the healthy, wealthy young girl who wants expensive cosmetic surgery. Not so great for the elderly gentleman who needs expensive drugs for the rest of his life and is likely to have numerous issues in the future based on his history.

Also, you wouldn't have any choice in whether Michael O'Leary was in charge or not if it was private and open to the free market.

opti0nal · 17-06-2012 04:56PM

Markcheese wrote: »

J
You wouldn't privatise the Gardai or the army ... but there's loads of things that could be and probably should be privatised and tendered for..

If you would not privitise the army or Gardai who protect public safety, why would you privitise public health?

Public services are run by the government in situations where the private sector cannot be trusted to operate in interests of the public good. That's why the banks were largely taken out of private control.

sarumite · 17-06-2012 04:57PM

itzme wrote: »

I think you've mis-interpreted me, I'm all for debating privatising certain areas of the public sector. This is not what the OP was asking though, which is why my two posts were dismissive of the OP question as it was in IMO an overly simplistic question which implied the usual Public = bad, Private = good. It seems you agree with me that privatising the whole public sector is a silly idea.

On the rest of your post, I agree there are some areas that the government should look at alternatives like outsourcing. However, I often find the volume of this is overstated. Also sometimes the knock on effects as Kyussbishop has said are not thought of. Could you say which area's you think we should privatise, I assume (and could be wrong) you mean payroll and areas like that?

I am a little busy at the moment to discuss areas I feel the government do not need to be that organisation actually performing the work, although as an example law and order are areas where there shouldn't be privatisation.

However, Kyussbishop (and many others) arguments are very much based on a libertarian viewpoint.

The op said "Any organization could tender for the work, would not matte if they were a for profit company, a charity, or a group of employees the only criteria would be that they meet the standards required and that they were the cheapest."

From this I gathered that the government would be paying for the service, just not providing it. So the the whole Ryanair health care discussion is a bit moot. The choice is whether the government pay for you to fly ryanair or aerlingus. I have spent a lot of the last 4 years living in Sweden and it is a libertarians nightmare. That said, the universal healthcare in Sweden relies heavily on private hospitals to perform routine work which frees up many of the government run hospitals to specialise in a particular area.

KyussBishop · 17-06-2012 06:10PM

I suppose government outsourcing to private partners is a more reasoned approach in some areas, and is not as extreme as completely eliminating government involvement; I've not explored that in detail, but I suppose semi-private schools are a good example.

Where would that be well-applied? (and would people be given a choice in selecting which private actor provides the service?)

Stheno · 17-06-2012 06:18PM

mariaalice wrote: »

Such a system would dramatically reduce the amount of public services employees and thus the problem of public services pensions.

There is legislation such as TUPE to consider in the scenario you are outlining.

secretambition · 17-06-2012 06:41PM

sarumite wrote: »

The op said "Any organization could tender for the work, would not matte if they were a for profit company, a charity, or a group of employees the only criteria would be that they meet the standards required and that they were the cheapest."

From this I gathered that the government would be paying for the service, just not providing it. So the the whole Ryanair health care discussion is a bit moot. The choice is whether the government pay for you to fly ryanair or aerlingus. I have spent a lot of the last 4 years living in Sweden and it is a libertarians nightmare. That said, the universal healthcare in Sweden relies heavily on private hospitals to perform routine work which frees up many of the government run hospitals to specialise in a particular area.

It's not moot because the private company will have objectives set out for them, but like any service provider, they will have a certain amount of discretion as to how to achieve those goals and can potentially cut corners if all they care about is profit. They are contractors at the end of the day and can't have every move dictated to them like some employees might. You can't cover every situation in a contract. New situations will arise that noboby has thought of. Therefore you need a culture where the health providers aren't solely motivated by profit so that there can be some level of trust there.

sarumite · 17-06-2012 07:25PM

secretambition wrote: »

It's not moot because the private company will have objectives set out for them, but like any service provider, they will have a certain amount of discretion as to how to achieve those goals and can potentially cut corners if all they care about is profit. They are contractors at the end of the day and can't have every move dictated to them like some employees might. You can't cover every situation in a contract. New situations will arise that noboby has thought of. Therefore you need a culture where the health providers aren't solely motivated by profit so that there can be some level of trust there.

While I know people always comment that private companies cut corners, I am not sure how much of that is based in reality and how much is based on irrational fear. I personally do not know of private hospitals or private schools that have cut corners. The reality is in a private hospital the doctors and nurses who do the work aren't motivated by profit anymore than a doctor or nurse in a public hospital. The adherence to budgets will be no less constrained in a public hospital than a private hospital. I do think a private hospital would be more pro-active about streamlining their adminstration process than the HSE has been prior to being forced to do so. In my opinion the Irish government have shown that it lacks the ability to adapt staffing levels appropriately.

secretambition · 17-06-2012 08:10PM

sarumite wrote: »

While I know people always comment that private companies cut corners, I am not sure how much of that is based in reality and how much is based on irrational fear. I personally do not know of private hospitals or private schools that have cut corners. The reality is in a private hospital the doctors and nurses who do the work aren't motivated by profit anymore than a doctor or nurse in a public hospital. The adherence to budgets will be no less constrained in a public hospital than a private hospital. I do think a private hospital would be more pro-active about streamlining their adminstration process than the HSE has been prior to being forced to do so. In my opinion the Irish government have shown that it lacks the ability to adapt staffing levels appropriately.

Private hospital and private schools at the moment market themselves as the high quality option. A private school can't cut corners because people quite simply won't pay for a worse alternative that what they could get for free. However, the OP advocated giving the contract to the cheapest, so you are looking at the budget, shave-off-every-penny-you-can-to-get-the-tender attitude rather than the we-sell-a-premium-product-and-you-pay-for-that approach that exists with private schools and hospitals at the moment. It moves from an Aer Lingus to a Ryanair situation.

Markcheese · 17-06-2012 08:18PM

secretambition wrote: »

Markcheese wrote: »

Ryanair style health care would be great.,,, more routes, more choice, more people using it ,all at far lower cost ..... Brand new equipment....... And run by a hand full of people ( what do the dept of health do ) reacting quicky.
Admittedly I wouldn't put Michael o Leary in charge of overall health care provision and planning.....he was advocating the American system, where the health care spend is higher in total per person overall( hospitals, doctors pharmacies) but the health outcomes are actually worse per head ... Fine if yr rich with good insurance ... not great on low to average income..

More routes and more choice as long as you're profitable. Ryanair don't fly places to make a loss. Great for the healthy, wealthy young girl who wants expensive cosmetic surgery. Not so great for the elderly gentleman who needs expensive drugs for the rest of his life and is likely to have numerous issues in the future based on his history.

Also, you wouldn't have any choice in whether Michael O'Leary was in charge or not if it was private and open to the free market.

I would imagine the old boy on medication would be a bit like a regular customer ... Very valuable indeed ... I didn't say that the Hse or it's replacement should disappear just the service provider should tender for contract to provide for eg dialysis,or orthopaedics, and if they can provide a better service cheaper while making a profit, brilliant.. and yes some procedures will cost the state more to provide than others, some small hospitals may cost more to run than large ones but our state may decide that's socially desirable ..... Our current healthcare system isn't great, many of the same issues for decades. And it's not cheap either so maybe a change is worth looking at.... But I'm not advocating US model which is great if your rich .....

Markcheese · 17-06-2012 08:38PM

opti0nal wrote: »

Markcheese wrote: »

J
You wouldn't privatise the Gardai or the army ... but there's loads of things that could be and probably should be privatised and tendered for..

If you would not privitise the army or Gardai who protect public safety, why would you privitise public health?

Public services are run by the government in situations where the private sector cannot be trusted to operate in interests of the public good. That's why the banks were largely taken out of private control.

Bit of a misunderstanding here I don't want to privatise public health. I'd like to see more health care providers, competing for government contracts....to do specific jobs and services at a certain price, and to be held to account for quality of service on threat of losing their contract....if mallow hospital had spare theatre time and staff and using their facilities more efficiently could tender to provide for extra colonoscopies and safegaurd theatres and rural jobs ... Or if a company could run an existing CT scanner 24/7 getting rid of backlogs and giving out of hours cover where none existed before , cheaply,brilliant. Most of what's wrong in our current system is management ... That could be changed....

sarumite · 17-06-2012 08:44PM

secretambition wrote: »

Private hospital and private schools at the moment market themselves as the high quality option. A private school can't cut corners because people quite simply won't pay for a worse alternative that what they could get for free. However, the OP advocated giving the contract to the cheapest, so you are looking at the budget, shave-off-every-penny-you-can-to-get-the-tender attitude rather than the we-sell-a-premium-product-and-you-pay-for-that approach that exists with private schools and hospitals at the moment. It moves from an Aer Lingus to a Ryanair situation.

From the OP
" they meet the standards required and that they were the cheapest"

secretambition · 17-06-2012 08:57PM

sarumite wrote: »

From the OP
" they meet the standards required and that they were the cheapest"

My point is that you can't set out the standards in as much detail as necessary. When you contract out, you pay for an end goal e.g. provision of treatment for illness X. You can make some specifications as to how you would like that treatment provided e.g. patient to be seen within X time or whatever, but you cannot plan for every single situation. What about when a new drug becomes available which is cheaper than the current one and most scientists agree that it is just as good, but a few highly respected ones say it is not. The company want to switch. Who wins? There will always be situations in the future that cannot be planned for where discretion comes into it, and you want that discretion exercised by people who don't have ulterior motives (profit in this case) when it comes to health. You cannot dictate every detail of practice to a contractor like you could to your employee.

Delancey · 17-06-2012 10:08PM

A key ' danger ' associated with large scale privatisation is the inevitable compilation and use of statistics to support various opinions. ' Key metrics ' such as waiting times for beds or exam results will become the focus to the complete negelect of everything else.
There are lies , damned lies and statistics.......

Should

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