Public Private Security Partnership
This arrangement basically represents the relationship between in business between the government and a private owned establishments. The meaning of this is that the relationship is of a cooperative nature, between two or more establishment of the public and private sector. This relationship is of a long term nature. The purpose of establishing this relationship is most times to either complete a project or to provide services for the citizens of the country. A concise definition of a public private partnership as given by the OECD exposed some features of the business arrangement. It was defined by this organization as a long term arrangement mutually binding, between the government and a private partner where the private partner delivers and funds public services using capital assets, sharing the associated risks. This definition reveals that the relationship is contractual in nature. By being contractual, this means that both the government and the private individual or group of privately owned establishments involved both have a part to play to make sure the business venture of successful. There are quite different types of Public private partnerships. This categorization in most cases rooted on the funding mechanism of the establishment. This in subsequent words means that there are so many ways this business establishment could turn up and it more cases they are graded by how they are funded and or who bears the risk in the business. Could be the government, could be the private establishment. That will be further explained. For now we will examine a few ways these establishment could be funded which could be the major reason for its creation. The government could want to make a service available to the citizens but they lack the required funds to make the project work. In this situations what will most likely be the right course of action will be to align with a private company who will provide the funding for the projects while the government will provide the required expertise and model required for the business to work and achieve the main set of purposes for which it was created. The special thing about this arrangement is that the model of financing is quite different from the traditional methods where the bank will give loans with a collateral and expect payment within a rather short and defined period. Under this model in The United Kingdom for instance, Bonds are used. The private establishment provides financial bonds which to a normal persons are not the regular money but are pieces of paper that are of money equivalent. They make these things available to government to use to complete the project. Besides bonds the private establishment might provide loan to be paid back within five years. This model is used in places like Canada. The next model of funding is the system where the direct users of the service, pays for the services given. A close observation of this model will reveal the the users or beneficiaries of this service provided. In this model all the government does is provide the system. The private company sets up the needed apparatus and recuperates the cost of setting up and additional income from the users of this services which is in most cases either the members of the general public or a great section of the public. An example of this type of model is the toll gate establishment. The private company sets it up but the driving population in the area pays for it. The next model of this arrangement is the Arrangement where the private establishment presents a capital investment but the cost of providing this services is borne by the government. The agreement with the government under this model is to provide the agreed on services upon the condition that the government will provide the cost of providing theses services. In this model what the government is usually after is the privately owned company with the required expertise needed to make the services are success. This model is used by some of the existent security agencies. Most times even in the military. We have heard about the argument in some countries about the use of private military establishment to support the military of the country during times of unrest. Some of this private military institutions have the setup the manpower the needed tactical equipment and gadgets and intelligence. The government just comes in to pay for their services and the business is established. These are the three most popular models of Public private partnership.
RISK MANAGEMENT
One of the strong questions in a serious business arrangement is about risks. Risks is a term used to capture any situation that will lead to loss of money and a complete disintegration of the whole business arrangement. In a certain case for instance where the government and privately owned construction company undertook to build a laboratory center. It turned out that upon the commencement of the construction, it was discovered that the cost of completely the building is quite more larger than what was estimated. This is one of the risks that should be placed in view. Pubic-private partnership is usually selected above other business arrangement for one main reason which is that it creates an avenue where the public private partnership establishment successfully transfers the risk of the business to the private establishment. There are so many reasons for this transfer. One of these very many reasons is that between the government and the private owned establishment, the private owned establishment is placed as a risk bearer. They stayed to take the hit in case of a fall while the government pays them for being in that situation. What this means is that, the contract is usually crafted in a way that for carrying the risks, the government pays the private owned establishment. This model in practice has proven to be inefficient. It does not reflect what it seeks to defend. The payment the government gives to the private owned company for being the bearer of the risk is in most cases more difficult than the cost risk. In practice therefore we could see that in most of these business arrangement the real carrier of the risk is the taxpayers in the society paying heavily the enable the government meet up with the financial obligations of paying the risk bearer.
SECURITY INTELLIGENCE
In the area of security intelligence, Public-private partnership is almost a must, actually it is inevitable. Without the telecommunications companies working an unison with the police, some crimes may never have been solved. Without the the installation of security cameras and most security which in most cases are produced by private owned establishments, the whole idea of security intelligence and its efficacy maybe roughly undermined. It is on this premise that in the area of security intelligence, public private partnerships are inevitable. It actually better these partnership exists before the need for them arise, so they can be used expediently. Developed countries understand that security intelligence is a general concern of which no one person can claim to be completely grounded in. It is a project which only takes combine efforts of the best brains with the best equipment which neither the government or any one establishment can claim to have.
LAW ENFORCEMENT
Just like the private military previously mentioned, as it concerns law enforcement, the government partner with private establishment. Take for instance the police. They partner with car producing companies which provide for the many cars needed to make sure that the law is enforcement. Of course this will come at a price but place of public private partnership in the place of law enforcement cannot be neglected. While building police stations, building agencies mostly privately owned are partnered with. While making arrangements for the installation of internet protocols and firewalls in the Cyber system of the police, Privately owned tech companies are involved and partnered with. It is on this point that it is certain that without the partnership of the government and some of these private establishment the efforts of law enforcement may not be as effective as is required.
COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT
In most cases even the citizens and non-citizens in the country making use of this services take active part directly or indirectly in the funding and furtherance of this partnership. The truth is that the general public takes part in the funding of this partnership through the payment of taxes. In other situation, they make a more direct input in this arrangement. We have previously mentioned the toll gates. Here across states citizens pay an amount of money to be screened and checked at these different security posts. The payment they make goes directly to support the private companies involved in that arrangement.
We have seen from the discussion so far that public private partnership is most times unavoidable, there are different types according to the way it is being funded. We also discovered that although in theory the government is said to have transferred to risk to the private company, in practice however the last person who the risk may rest on could be the taxpayer. This could be one of the major disadvantage of this arrangement.
By Doug Ruhl, VP of Business Development
Strategic Security Corp.
