Not including every aspect of public costs can mean the difference between finding that a PPP is or is not cost effective. For example, Allyson M. Pollock, Jean Shaoul, and Neil Vickers found in a study that advocates of the privately financed hospitals in Great Britain were correct to include the cost of transferred risks, but that they calculated the risk transfer in such a way that private financing appeared the best option in almost every case.65
One of the most effective ways for an interest group to build the case for or against a PPP is to distort the PCC by excluding specific costs. Ensuring that you have considered every cost is the best way to counteract this bias in favor an objective PCC to use in deciding whether to go forward with a PPP. Phil Russel echoed this sentiment following his vast experiences in PPPs with the Texas Department of Transportation: "[The process needs] to look at hard and soft costs. [It n]eeds to be the whole picture."66
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65 Pollock, A. M., Shaoul, J. & Vickers, N. (2002). Private Finance And "Value For Money" In NHS Hospitals: A Policy In Search Of A Rationale?. British Medical Journal, 324(7347), 1205-1209.
66 Russel, Phil. (2011, March 10). Telephone interview.