Australian PPPs have been used for delivering projects such as major toll roads,[22] hospitals,[23] prisons,[24] schools,[25] utilities[26] and sporting facilities.[27] There is no one resource that provides an accurate and current list of these projects. Table 1, which is drawn from two Australian Council for Infrastructure Development databases[28] and from internet searches, provides a summary of the number and value of PPP projects in 11 project categories entered into in the period between 1980 and 2005.[29] Whilst Table 1 aims to capture the total PPP cost to governments on a net present cost basis,[30] it, nonetheless, due to incomplete disclosures, is based on a mixture of costs that have been determined on different bases.[31] The end result is a table containing 127 projects worth $35 669 million.
Table 1 indicates that Victoria is the dominant Australian jurisdiction in relation to both the number of PPP projects and the total net present cost of those projects. Of the 127 projects, 38.6 per cent (49 projects), worth 39.4 per cent ($14 061 million) of the total PPP net present cost, are located in Victoria. Twenty three point six per cent (30 projects), accounting for 29.7 per cent ($10 593 million) of total PPP net present cost, are based in NSW. At the end of 2005, neither the Commonwealth nor the Australian Capital Territory were party to any PPP projects.[32]
Despite comprising only one-tenth of the total number of projects, road projects account for one-third of spending on PPP projects. On the other hand, the 22 water projects, representing one-sixth of the total number of projects, account for only 4 per cent of the net present cost of all PPPs. Other significant project categories are the correctional and health sectors. Whilst correctional projects outnumber health projects by 13 to 12, the cost of the health projects greatly exceeds the cost of the correctional projects. Health projects account for 7.5 per cent of the total net present cost of the 127 projects, whereas correctional projects account for 4.4 per cent of the total net present cost.
It is difficult to draw conclusions about observed project allocations, other than to speculate that they are more likely to flourish in circumstances that are not highly politically charged, in which risk can most easily be transferred to the private sector, and which provide private consortia with relative certainty of achieving desired returns.