The Western Cape Department of Health has entered into its very first Public Private Partnership (PPP) involving two public health facilities on the Lentegeur Hospital Site in Mitchell's Plain and private companies.

The Public Private Partnership is a 12 year contractual arrangement with a total Net Present Value of R344 million (indexed annually over the 12 year period), for the provision of:

• facilities management services like catering and cleaning grounds and gardens at the Lentegeur Hospital and the Western Cape Rehabilitation Centre (WCRC);
• maintenance of the WCRC buildings and
• maintenance, refreshment and replacement of medical and therapeutic equipment over the 12 year period at the WCRC.

The Department's partner in this venture is Mpilisweni Facility Services Consortium (Pty) LTD, made up of Drake and Scull, Vuya Investments and Folang Joint Venture, all of which are black owned companies. "The consortium brings a wealth of experience and knowledge of facilities management and is committed to uplift the community by employing 70% of its work staff from the Cape Flats" Minister Uys said today at the signing ceremony of the contract.

The Lentegeur Hospital is a psychiatric facility with 940 beds that renders forensic, acute and child and adolescent psychiatric services. The Lentegeur Hospital is a community hospital that provides treatment and care, opportunities for rehabilitation and a significant focus of reintegrating patients back into the community.

The Western Cape Rehabilitation Centre with 208 beds provides a comprehensive, interdisciplinary approach to rehabilitation services for physically disabled patients on an in and outpatient basis. The main focus of this centre is to reintegrate patients back into the community and to enable patients to be independent which includes personal care, work assessment, daily living activities and socialisation.

"Minister Brown says that the occasion today is but another demonstration of the commitment of the Western Cape Government to the process of ensuring that there is closer collaboration and partnership between the private and public sector in our combined commitment to making this Province an important nerve centre in our country. PPP must also be directly beneficial to the people in whose neighborhoods they operate. Every PPP must therefore be deigned and pro-actively seek, to produce a positive socio-economic impact in any way that is appropriate to the project and it's location."

Minister Uys said that in line with the Department's stated strategy, there was no loss of jobs and after consultation and taking into consideration their preferences, Some staff were redeployed to other departmental health facilities.