‘Let private companies run public services’ – David Cameron

The changes, to be included in a White Paper in the next fortnight, could allow companies to take over schools, hospitals and council services.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Mr Cameron said the reforms “signal the decisive end of the old-fashioned, top-down, take-what-you’re-given model of public services”. The “grip of state control” would be loosened.

“We will create a new presumption – backed up by new rights for public service users and a new system of independent adjudication – that public services should be open to a range of providers competing to offer a better service,” he wrote.

“Instead of having to justify why it makes sense to introduce competition in some public services – as we are now doing with schools and in the NHS – the state will have to justify why it should ever operate a monopoly.”

“Naked right-wing agenda.” TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber

The Prime Minister’s plans were condemned by the Trades Union Congress. General Secretary Brendan Barber said: “This is a naked right wing agenda that takes us right back to the most divisive years of the 1980s.

“The Prime Minister has been telling us that the cuts are sadly necessary, not a secret political project to destroy public services. Yet today’s proposal to privatise everything that moves is exactly the kind of proposal that voters would reject if put at an election.

“Public service workers should be very afraid. The real profits will come from attacking their terms and conditions, and will only entrench the longest decline in living standards for ordinary people since the 1920s. This is classic nasty party stuff.”

‘Bare knuckle fight’

Rail Maritime and Transport union leader Bob Crow said Mr Cameron would “have a bare knuckle fight on his hands as trade unions join with local communities to defend everything from hospitals to fire services”.

Caroline Flint, Shadow Communities and Local Government Secretary, said: “People will not be convinced a free market, free-for-all is the right way to improve public services. All of us want to see the best public services.

“What we see today is big rhetoric from the Prime Minister, but little evidence of how he will actually improve services. All people see at the moment is the undermining of a range of public services with his decision to go too far and too fast on the deficit.”

Mr Cameron said the national security services and the judiciary would not be included in the shake-up. But he argued that his plans were “a vital part of our mission to dismantle Big Government and build the Big Society in its place”.

In future, the state would have to justify why it should be allowed to operate as a monopoly. Choice would be extended, “whether it’s patients having the freedom to choose which hospital they get treated in or parents having a genuine choice over their child’s school”.

Decision-making powers would be devolved to the lowest possible level, giving more people “the right to take control of the budget for the service they receive”.

“The grip of state control will be released.” Prime Minister David Cameron

The State would still have a “crucial role to play” in ensuring fair funding, competition and access. “But these important responsibilities for central government must never become an automatic excuse for returning to central control.

“That’s why our Open Public Services White Paper is so important. The principles it sets out will make it impossible for government to return to the bad old days of the standard state monopoly.”

The Prime Minister said he was not trying to destabilise public services. “These are practical reforms, driven by a clear rationale that the best way to raise quality and value for money is to allow different providers to offer services in an open and accountable way. Our public services desperately need an injection of openness, creativity and innovation.”

‘Policies don’t match up to his rhetoric’

Andrew Haldenby, director of think tank Reform, said: “The need to get value in public spending means that the Prime Minister is right to confront the opponents of change, but his policies don’t match up to his rhetoric.

“The Government’s new central directions on hospital services, to the NHS workforce and to the school curriculum all contradict his wish to decentralise.”

“Decisions on what to tender need to be taken locally.” Baroness Margaret Eaton, Chairman, LGA

Baroness Margaret Eaton, Chairman of the Local Government Association, said: “Councils across the country already outsource many services to voluntary groups, charities and businesses, and are well versed in working with various organisations.

“Different areas have different pressures and decisions on what to tender need to be taken locally, with town halls best placed to make those judgements.”

Mr Crow said the Government would “privatise the air that we breathe if they thought they could away with it”.

He added: “Cameron wants to give his big business supporters the chance to make a profit out of every section of our public services and he will have a bare knuckle fight on his hands as trade unions join with local communities to defend everything from hospitals to fire services.

“Today’s announcement shows that Cameron’s Tories, and his Lib Dem allies, are the most ideologically right-wing Government since the early 80s.”