The empirical research agenda on PPPs has been dominated by researchers who have generally tackled specific issues and employed case study approaches. More comprehensive empirical analysis of PPPs has been confined to studies undertaken or commissioned by governments, most notably the UK Government. Hodge (2005, p.327) considered that:
The absence of any rigorous and transparent evaluations of Australasian PPPs represents a significant accountability shortfall, and we are left relying on only a few pieces of empirical evidence when attempting to make up the accountability jigsaw.
What is forgotten in this appeal, is that if there has been an accountability shortfall, it has been disproportionately shared by Traditional procurement. In Australia there is no transparent research that investigates the efficacy and VFM credentials of Traditional procurement, and no sense of whether performance has been improving over time, as has been suggested in the UK by the Mott MacDonald and other studies.
The only comprehensive studies comparing PPP and Traditional approaches, such as Mott MacDonald, Arthur Andersen LSE, and the UK Office of National Assessments have been undertaken in the UK, are relatively dated now.