[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 68 (Thursday, May 17, 2001)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E830]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       THE TREND OF PRIVATIZATION

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. TED STRICKLAND

                                of ohio

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, May 16, 2001

  Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, I want to address a trend that I find 
very disturbing; a trend that I encounter again and again across a 
spectrum of seemingly unrelated issues. It is the trend of 
privatization, the trend of government forfeiting its responsibilities 
to those it serves.
  I believe strongly that certain societal functions are so important 
that they simply must be carried out by the government, namely the 
imprisonment of criminals and the maintenance of a health care safety 
net for our most vulnerable citizens. Now, I realize that these two 
functions are extremely divergent, but both are vitally important to 
society. The purpose of imprisonment is to protect the public from 
dangerous individuals who are paying a debt to society, and the purpose 
of the public health safety net is to protect the public, particularly 
the poor, from the ravages of preventable and treatable disease.
  These two public functions have one very important thing in common: 
once we privatize them and turn over their missions to profit-making 
entities, we will never be able to rebuild what we have lost.
  Public hospitals and public health centers provide a vital service as 
part of our national health care delivery system; they provide care to 
those who would be turned away from other institutions for not having 
health insurance. They often serve the poorest and the sickest 
populations, and are particularly attuned to the health consequences of 
delayed care, poverty, poor nutrition and chronic disease. Because 
these institutions are directly accountable to the public, they serve 
the public well--better, I would argue, than a privatized counterpart. 
I am not saying that private hospitals are not important or that they 
do not provide their share of uncompensated care, because they do, and 
we need to have them around. I am saying that public health care 
providers play a very important role in the health care marketplace, 
and they are unique in that they are more directly accountable to the 
public than are their private counterparts. More important, once we 
break our commitment to providing public health care by privatizing 
this service, we will find it very difficult, if not impossible, to re-
establish this vital component of our comprehensive health care 
delivery system. I fear that we are moving toward this unfortunate 
state of affairs right now in our nation's capitol with the proposed 
privatization of DC General Hospital. Mr. Speaker, I believe that the 
plan to privatize DC General is, like most privatization plans, an 
extremely shortsighted measure that will jeopardize the availability of 
quality health care for some of the city's poorest citizens.
  Likewise, the privatization of our nation's prisons is a practice 
that I find equally repugnant. The need to make a profit creates an 
incentive for private prison companies to cut comers when it comes to 
the security of the facility and the quality of correction personnel. 
The result is understaffing, low wages, inadequate training, poor 
benefits, and difficult working conditions. Reports from various 
private facilities reveal a failure to fill staff positions, a failure 
to provide government mandated programs that involve proper 
correctional officer training and prisoner rehabilitation programs, and 
a failure to implement tested, comprehensive security measures. 
Additionally, when governments contract out with private prison 
operators, taxpayers lose much in the way of valuable oversight tools. 
Nevertheless, they are still forced to assume much of the financial and 
legal liability associated with the operation of private prisons. If 
there are riots or breakouts, local government authorities are called 
in to handle the situation. When a private prison official violates an 
inmates rights, the taxpayers from the community--not the prison 
corporation--foot the bill for the lawsuit.
  Whether it's the security of our prison system or the health care of 
America's poorest citizens, privatization is a risky business that 
could cost us dearly down the road. I hope that the Congress will take 
very seriously its responsibility to the American public and not 
continue efforts to privatize safety net health care providers or the 
nation's prison system.

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