It is more than six years since former chancellor Philip Hammond officially abolished the private finance initiative (PFI) in England, branding the model “inflexible and overly complex”.

The Conservatives never warmed to the particular brand of public private partnership (PPP) deals after coming to power in 2010, even though New Labour had by then used PFI deliver more than 600 individual projects across the UK. A reformed version, branded PF2, saw it limp on, but it was only ever used on a handful of projects before Hammond sent it to the knackers’ yard in November 2018.

Now, a new Labour government has arrived promising an era of “national renewal” – but seemingly without any money in the coffers to deliver it. Despite its history when in power, Labour in opposition was no fan of PFI, and ministers are understood to have arrived in the Treasury last summer with no desire to restart a big programme of using private finance for public works.