The 2017 annual report of Ontario’s Auditor General once again points to major problems with privatization and lack of capacity in the health care system. Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk continues to criticize systemic problems with Ontario’s public-private partnership (P3) program, and identifies six key problems with the maintenance of Ontario’s 16 P3 hospitals. There are long-term ongoing disputes with privatized P3 contractors over the P3 agreements, including about what is covered by the P3 contract. (In Ontario, P3s have been rebranded as Alternative Financing and Procurement, or AFP.) Hospitals are required to pay higher than reasonable rates to the P3 contractor for maintenance work the contractor has deemed to be outside of the P3 contract. Hospitals are almost forced to use P3 contractors to do maintenance work the contractors deem outside of the P3 contract or face the prospect of transferring the risk associated with maintaining the related hospital assets from the private-sector company back to the hospital. P3 companies with poor performance … Read more…