UNION leaders in Blackburn have criticised possible plans to fund building work at Queen's Park Hospital and St Wilfrid's School using money from private businesses.

Members of Blackburn and District Trades Council say are opposed to the Private Finance Initiative which helps pay for public sector building work with private cash.

St Wilfrid's School is waiting to find out if it will be able to pay for much needed work to repair crumbling classrooms which were labelled a health and safety hazard in an Ofsted report in March.

And the next phase of work at Queen's Park Hospital may also be paid for through private rather than public coffers. But trades council leaders have des- cribed the schemes as having a "buy now, pay later" philosophy which would transfer cashflow problems to the future while posing a threat to services and staff conditions.

Council secretary Ian Gallagher said: "We want to see investment in health and education as much as everyone else, but the ends don't justify the means.

"Labour's election manifesto said that they would find a new relationship for the private and public sector parts of PFI.

"The scheme remains, however, very much as it was designed by the previous government, with flaws so fundamental that in the end it will be bad news for everybody."

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