Privatisation of County Council Services
Tory-controlled Surrey County Council is continuing to privatise the services it is legally required to provide. The Council's educational services have been privatised, see "Surrey Schools Services sold to Defence Contractor" dated 31st July 2003. With effect from 1st April 2004, they are now provided by VT Four S Limited. The Liberal Democrats are concerned that the Tories are obsessed with privatising more and more services, even though the Council seems increasingly to be encountering problems with those it has already privatised.
For example:
- The Council has had to set aside £17,000,000 from the sale of assets in order to cover possible future difficulties arising from the privatised waste contract. That's £17,000,000 that could otherwise have been used to fund front-line services.
- The Council's Children's Service, already facing criticism from the Audit Commission and the Social Services Inspectorate, has now had its knuckles rapped by its own legal advisers for wrongly attempting to delegate to a private firm some of its legal responsibilities for children leaving care.
- When the Connexions youth advisory service was set up, unlike some other local authorities Surrey County Council opted not to retain a lead position in the partnership with other agencies. As a consequence, it now appears that the Connexions Service in Surrey may be liable to pay VAT charges of some £800,000 unless the Council changes its position.
- Under the new "Mamoth" contracts for highway maintenance and improvement, private contractors are responsible not only for doing the work, but also for designing schemes and carrying out safety inspections of their own work.
David Timms, Liberal Democrat County Councillor for Dorking South, comments: "When it comes to the proper discharge of the County Council's legal responsibilities, private contractors should be on tap to provide specific services under Council supervision, not on top to decide how and when those services should be delivered, because they are not democratically accountable to the public. It's particularly worrying that, in spite of all these emerging problems, Surrey County Council still seems hell-bent on pursuing its privatisation agenda."