The South Australian Government recognises the critical importance of infrastructure in fostering a more productive economy. The Government is committed to encouraging private sector investment in public infrastructure where such investment brings clear benefits to the community. Partnerships SA is a procurement program for the private and public sectors that seeks to promote private sector participation in the delivery of Government services to the community where there are sound reasons to support this approach.
The Government is strongly opposed to privatisation. Partnering arrangements are not privatisation. Under a partnering arrangement, the Government retains a key strategic interest in the infrastructure and strong policy control over the services delivered, and in many cases, shares the risks of the project in agreement with the private sector partner over the life of the service agreement.
In striving to improve the range and quality of public services, opportunities will exist to harness the potential of both the public and private sectors. The private sector can contribute innovative ideas and commercial discipline to the process. Equally, the public sector has a crucial role to play in protecting the public interest and safeguarding taxpayers' funds, having responsibility for deciding the level of services required given available resources and establishing and monitoring safety, quality and performance standards.
There is therefore the potential for the private sector to be involved in a broad spectrum of the Government's public capital works program beyond the traditional design and construction of public buildings and facilities. The forms of public-private involvement range from operating contracts over publicly owned facilities to ownership of infrastructure assets where services are either purchased by Government or directly by the community. The types of projects envisaged by the Government in engaging the private sector are provided in Attachment A.