We demand a full inquiry into rip-off NHS PFI contracts (which cost 3-5x more than Govt funded infrastructure), and the impact on LIBOR rigging by banks on PFI and public finance. 

Success could mean NHS PFI contracts are torn up or renegotiated with more favourable terms for the taxpayer, preventing a wave of job losses and A & E service closures, which would otherwise tip the NHS into crisis, resulting in privatisation.

Twelve of the 30 NHS trusts most challenged on emergency performance are saddled with large and growing commitments to service PFI bills for the next 20 years or more, with PFI hospitals that cost £2.7 billion to build, but which will cost upwards of £16.7 billion to pay back. 

'Ringfenced' PFI contract spending is increasing to pay out the banks, whilst front line NHS staff are sacked and hospital facilities are being closed.

Recently Government announced plans for a review of local government PFI contracts to achieve 5% "efficiency savings" for the taxpayer. Such PFI reviews must be expanded, both in scope to consider LIBOR rigging, and to include the NHS and other public sector authorities.

The LIBOR interest rate benchmark manipulated by global banks from at least 2005 to 2012 affects approximately $450 trillion in financial assets including loans, PFI contracts, mortgages, and deposits.

Manipulation of LIBOR is a zero-sum game, if banks were making money, then someone was losing on the other side of the trades...

Some of those who lost money are public institutions, NHS trusts, councils, universities, housing associations, police & fire authorities, with loans, endowments, investments, pensions, PFI contracts, and interest rate swaps linked to the manipulated LIBOR rate.

Yet 18 months after the LIBOR scandal emerged, described by Matt Taibbi as the 'biggest insider trading you could possibly imagine', we are yet to hear a word about the victims in the UK media...?

Instead of using the proceeds of LIBOR fines levied against the banks to investigate public sector losses and compensate victims, George Osborne has handed the funds directly to military charities.

Many public authorities lack the resources and financial expertise to determine LIBOR losses, and/ or the legal resources to challenge the banks.

NHS expert Allyson Pollock has explained how George Osborne's review of the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) to which the UK taxpayer has £320 billion in repayment exposure did not even consider the impact of LIBOR manipulation, which affects the swaps and derivatives attached to the PFI deals. In many cases PFI is directly financed by the same banks (Barclays, RBS, UBS, Deutsche Bank) which rigged LIBOR.

Evidence has emerged Barclays had a fund known as the "Ricardo Master Fund" named after investment banker Rich Ricci, which directly profited as LIBOR was rigged lower. Similar 'hedging strategies'which generated profits for the banks as LIBOR interest rates were rigged lower can also be seen within PFI contracts. 

FOI requests to the Financial Conduct Authority, Audit Commission and Treasury reveal that no Government department considers itself responsible for determining if public sector bodies such as councils and NHS Trusts have lost money through LIBOR fraud.

It's high time the Government stopped siding with the bankers and protected the public sector from further austerity cuts and bank fraud.

We demand an inquiry into LIBOR rigging's impact on public finances and PFI contracts, especially PFI within the NHS.

Not content to wait for Government action, a group of campaigners will begin a UK Citizen Debt Audit to determine taxpayer losses ourselves, and plan to present initial findings at a UK Citizen Debt Audit conference "Life Before Debt" S.O.A.S London on March 29 2014.

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