Private Finance Initiative

I am grateful to you, Mrs Main, for permitting me to speak again. I want to thank everyone who has contributed today. It has been a fascinating and extraordinarily enriching debate. I thank the Minister and the shadow Minister. I especially thank the Minister, who is not formally responsible for PFI, for discharging that responsibility today. I have three short comments. First, the claim that without the PFI products would not have been built is not true. A cheaper PFI could have been devised under which they would have been built. Secondly, far from being difficult to negotiate, a rebate is under way as we speak, and that process will culminate in the code of conduct that the Minister mentioned. I welcome the support given to the code of conduct by the Minister and other Ministers all the way up to the Chancellor. Thirdly, we need a wider debate, and I hope that we will have it in the main Chamber soon.