Will organisations have to corporatise their social welfare and healthcare services?

The Government outlined the social welfare and healthcare reform strategies in more detail on 5 April. According to the strategy guidelines, customers’ freedom of choice requires that public actors, companies and organisations stand in an equitable competitive position. In the video interview, Tuomas Pöysti, the project manager for the healthcare, social welfare and regional government reform, answers questions such as whether organisations must corporatise the social welfare and healthcare services they offer.

Link to the video interview:

http://youtu.be/Wb8f4v_L8pA

Transcript of the interview

Will organisations have to corporatise their social welfare and healthcare services?

“Corporatisation of organisations has not been discussed at all in the Government’s strategy guidelines. In other words, at the moment, the Government has not taken a stand on the matter. On the basis of these strategy guidelines, organisations do not need to begin to corporatise. When it comes to transparency and the clarity of the organisations’ own operation, corporatising may be sensible from the organisation’s point of view. But that is a different matter, and organisations can make that decision themselves. Of course, they must assess their operations so that if the organisation’s non-profit operation is supported by the Finnish Slot Machine Association or through some other channel, it has to keep the payable operation that it markets separate in a transparent manner.”

According to the Government’s strategy guidelines, counties are responsible for tasks with liability while in office. Such official duties are, for example, the decision to take a child into care and the decision on involuntary psychiatric treatment. How will that be implemented in corporatised production?

“In the final legislative preparation, we have to think more carefully about how official duties are allocated between the organiser and the producer. The idea is that the county as the provider exercises the significant public powers referred to in the Constitution. In other words, the organiser is always responsible for the operation of the authorities as a whole as well as for heavier measures that affect the individual’s status, such as taking into care and involuntary treatment. But the idea is that, in the production of services, it is possible to assign lighter official duties using criteria specified by law. In other words, administrative tasks that are related to the actual healthcare and social welfare operations can be allocated to companies in the production of services, too.”

Interview and video: Kimmo Vainikainen