Calgary – Alberta Liberal Education critic Harry Chase says that the Stelmach administration’s attempt to spin their announcement on P3 schools as a great success has instead revealed the weaknesses of public-private partnerships and called into question the province’s approach to new school construction.

While the government trumpets the savings realized by building schools using the P3 model, Bird Construction, a member of the B2L Partnership contracted to build ten new schools in Calgary and Edmonton, reported stronger than expected earnings. Bird Construction’s earnings report states “[O]ur higher pre-tax earnings are a result of favourable margins realized on our contracts, many of which were secured prior to the downturn in the economy.”

“Albertans deserve to know if these ‘favourable margins’ were earned on contracts to P3 school projects,” says Alberta Liberal Education critic Harry Chase. “The government hasn’t come forward with any of the details – even though the Auditor General has demanded more transparency and the release of a value for money report.”

It turns out that Bird Construction owns a company that built at least 13 P3 schools in Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia cancelled its P3 projects in 2001 because of cost overruns totaling $32 million. Nova Scotia’s Auditor General also blasted that province’s use of P3s to construct new schools. Bird’s Project Director of the Alberta Schools Project was the former vice president of the company connected with Nova Scotia’s failed P3 experiment.

“If Alberta doesn’t change direction now, we could be heading down the same path as Nova Scotia, with massive cost overruns that endanger schools our communities desperately need,” concludes Chase.

– 30 –

For more information contact:
albertaliberalcaucus
1-866-633-4214

[direct link to this article]