The debate on accountability of public service partnerships needs to be evidence based

The Democratic Audit blog has previously carried articles on government outsourcing by Stephen Wilks and Dan Silver – who argued that the government policy in this area has real implications for democracy. In response, Simon Parker of the New Local Government Network said that opponents of outsourcing were fighting the last war. Here, in response to Parker, Simon McMahon of the Social Innovation Partnership argues that this ongoing debate needs to be infused with a strong dose of hard evidence.