Increased third sector involvement in public service delivery over the past decade has had two significant consequences: better outcomes for service users and enormous growth in the third sector itself (with income, for instance, roughly doubling over 10 years). So the sector has grown its capacity to deliver better outcomes to ever larger numbers of people. These developments are clearly to be welcomed. But we could go further. One way to do so would be through partnerships with the private sector.
currently, there are various barriers that prevent many third sector organisations from engaging in public service delivery as much as they might, which in turn prevents service users from getting the outcomes they deserve. Partnership with the private sector won't dismantle all those barriers but it could help overcome some. In particular, private-third sector partnerships will be crucial in areas where commissioning is moving towards larger contracts and/or payment by results. In such cases, third sector organisations might be too small to deliver over the whole contract area, or might not be able to shoulder the cash-flow gaps associated with payment by results.
In the immediate term at least, without significant reform of public sector commissioning or third sector financing, the choice here is a stark one. either we encourage private-third sector partnerships and thereby enable our public services to draw on the expertise and connections that many third sector organisations have built up in particular delivery areas, or we don't encourage those partnerships, and so waste delivery capacity.
Bigger and better
Private-third sector partnerships do not just have the potential to avert unwanted outcomes such as the waste of provider capacity in areas where commissioning is moving towards contract aggregation or payment by results. They are also an opportunity for delivery organisations - private and third sector - to do bigger, better things. Third sector organisations can bring to the table a degree of specialist expertise and client trust that is of huge benefit to their private sector delivery partners. equally, private sector organisations can support their third sector partners to scale up their operations to cover previously unreachable areas, or give third sector providers access to back-office capacity (IT systems or legal and financial expertise, for example) that they would not otherwise enjoy.
Increasingly, all parties involved in the world of public service delivery are waking up to the potential benefits of private-third sector partnerships. The case studies here are a testament to that growing awareness. Similarly, government commissioners are starting to understand the potential associated with such partnerships, and are beginning to encourage more of them to form.
Nevertheless, we should not overstate the case. If all sectors are starting to wake up to the benefits of greater partnership working, 'starting' is the operative word. The reality is that private-third sector partnerships remain comparatively rare. Some government commissioners are still nervous of complicated delivery partnerships. Some private sector organisations still see the third sector as being peopled by well-meaning amateurs. And many third sector organisations still view the private sector with a suspicion prohibitive to genuine collaboration.
