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Published on
06 Feb 2023

PSA writes to the Premier - It is time to establish the Parliamentary Committee on South Australian privatisations

The PSA has a long and proud history of campaigning for well-funded public services to support our community. We will continue our relentless campaign for well-resourced, high quality and accessible public services for all South Australians and remain strongly opposed to privatisation.

In the lead-up to the 2022 state election, the PSA strongly advocated for and achieved commitments from the Australian Labor Party in relation to privatisation.

As well as a ban on future privatisations, the PSA also received commitment from the ALP that:

Labor will establish a parliamentary committee that will undertake in-depth reviews of contracts for existing outsourced and privatised services”.

The PSA has written to the Premier to follow up on the commitment, and to seek detail about the process and timeframes for setting up this important parliamentary committee. You can read our letter here (Letter to the Hon Peter Malinauskas MP 230206.pdf). Such a committee must allow the public to scrutinise privatised and outsourced services against a range of factors, including for example:

  • accountability
  • the analysis and mitigation of risks
  • quality and reliability of service provision
  • value for money
  • the value of contracts
  • the impact on the state budget
  • potential or actual conflicts of interests
  • whether or not there are any public or service guarantees

The PSA constantly hears from members across the public sector about the problems caused by outsourced, contracted and privatised services. The majority of members would have first-hand knowledge and experience of outsourced, contracted or privatised services not meeting their requirements sufficiently, be that on cost, service deliverables or both. It is hard to see how any of the currently outsourced, contracted or privatised services could stand up to scrutiny based on the above criteria.

    

If outsourced, contracted or privatised services are causing issues in your workplace, please contact the PSA with your experience. This information will help us to advocate for the return of privatised services to public control.

   


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