👉 Background: Back in 2019, a group called the Social Impact Investing Taskforce explored the possibility of a social impact investment bank. This was modelled on a similar bank in the UK called Big Society Capital. It didn’t make much progress at the time...

👉 What happened: Now, it’s back on the drawing board! This social impact investment bank would make private investments into a whole range of areas that could improve society. Think: social housing, aged care, early education or disability services.

👉 What else: The government reckons it’ll cost $400 million to set up and they want the Big Four banks to tip in half ($200 million). This is just another example of how public-private partnerships could work successfully.

What's the key learning?

💡A public–private partnership is a long-term arrangement between a government and private sector institutions. Generally, these public-private partnerships are able to unlock hundreds of millions of dollars in private investment for spending on public services.

💡 There are public-private partnerships between the government and infrastructure companies like Transurban as well as airport owners like Sydney Airport Corporation.

💡In fact, in Victoria, there are 32 projects worth around $30 billion in public-private partnerships right now. While this investment bank is unlikely to provide the same financial returns as a pure-play investment bank, like UBS or Barrenjoey, it can also help fix major social problems. Tick, tick, tick.

‍