Steve Goodman is back with his Golden Pothole of the Week. In his own words. Ed
This week’s Golden Pothole is again from Ventnor; specifically, Madeira Road (seen on my way to Bembridge; thanks for the nomination!).
I understand that (“leading”!) councillor Mazillius has said that as a critic of a PFI scheme, I must be stupidly ill-informed.
Presumably, he thinks the same about the government’s own spending watchdog and the Daily Telegraph, and anybody else lacking our council’s crystal balls, who thinks that a 25 year financial leap into the unknown is highly desirable.
PFI is no longer suitable
A reminder from last week; “PFI is no longer suitable for funding future projects”.
Another reminder: UK taxpayers owe over £120 billion for PFI projects worth less than £53 billion. I think the difference could have been better used to save jobs & services like those we are told we must lose because there is no alternative.
But then I do not know what Mr Mazillius and his friends know about the proposed Island Highways PFI deal: they say that much of what they do with our money must be kept from us for reasons of commercial confidentiality.
Can we see the evidence?
So if there is ever available a paper which details the costs and benefits of this scheme over the next 25 years, I think it would be more useful to share that information with us than to allege nitpicking and a lack of effort on our part.
The paper I did take away from the council meeting (contrary to the impression given by the CP article, some people aware of the horrible history of PFI did attend, and endured a long-winded prepared response to my asking when the council would catch up with the rest of us) states that the allocation of £262.3 million somehow equates to £487 million.
I’m beginning to understand why councillors Brown and Pugh chose to storm out of their own meeting when awkward questions were asked by other councillors.
Age of Stupid award
The mention of stupidity by Cllr Mazillius also reminded me of a report in the London Evening Standard on August 26th 2009, when our council ‘won’ the inaugural Age of Stupid award (for being a little slow on the uptake environmentally) .
Back to PFI; as the councillor says, this is a golden opportunity. I am glad that he agrees with me.
Another Golden Pothole next week.
