Private Finance Initiative Contracts

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:13 pm on 29 January 2019.

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Photo of Nick Ramsay Nick Ramsay Conservative 2:13, 29 January 2019

First Minister, I'm more than happy to support Mike Hedges in his call for that review of spending on PFI projects within Wales. We do know that some of the early PFIs particularly were very costly, and you've quoted the £100 million a year—£105 million a year—cost figure that the Wales Governance Centre have also provided.

Whilst I appreciate that your Government is certainly sceptical of PFI, you are supportive of the mutual investment model. Can you tell us what lessons have been learnt from some of those problems with the early PFI projects to make sure that the way that the Welsh Government works with the private sector to deliver initiatives using the MIM model doesn't encounter, over the longer term, some of the problems that PFI faced in the past?