財政短缺常是政府選擇 PFI 的主要原因之一，PFI 可以幫助政府克服財政上的兩難:即在緊縮的財政情況下，仍能透過較高的私人資本支出增加公共投資。本文主要的目的即在檢驗具有豐富 PFI 經驗的英國，尤其是新工黨執政時，是否符合這項假設。此外，本文也試圖回答新工黨選擇 PFI 的理由、主要的作法及其如何面對黨內 PFI 的反對者，以貫徹其執行 PFI 的決心。研究發現保守黨政府採取 PFI，確實存在政府部門面臨的財經壓力，工黨政府並非在財政壓力下，為了控制公共支出的規模選擇 PFI，而是基於 PFI 的效率和創新等市場原則的考慮。此外，工黨採用 PFI 另一目的在向中間趨近，贏得多數選民支持，可視為從 80 年代以來，工黨現代化議程中的一部份，用以改變工黨傳統反企業、反市場的標籤。因此，PFI 具有多元的面向，它可以幫助政府克服財政的兩難，也可以做為一項政治策略。

Financial shortage is the main reason governments choose PFI. Literature on PFI almost always argues that they can solve the government financial dilemmas under extreme conditions of retrenchment through more private capital spending to boost public investment. The purpose of this study is to examine whether the British government under the New Labor matches the hypothesis. Moreover, this study tries to find out why and how PFI has been adopted and carried through by the New Labor in spite of oppositions within the party. We find that when the Conservative governments encounter with economic and financial difficulties, they wield PFI to control the scale of public spending. By contrast, the New Labor’s decision to choose PFI, while under no financial pressure, is based on the market principle of efficiency and innovation. In addition, the New Labor employs PFI as a strategy to win the support of the moderate voters, which has been part of the New Labor’s modernization program since 1980s. This modernization program attempts to change traditional anti-business and anti-market label into pro-business and pro-market. We conclude that PFI has multi- dimensional purposes: not only to help fix government’s financial dilemma but also being a good political strategy.