Public services could be revolutionised under a new system that puts them in the hands of employees who will have a financial stake in their operation.

And Finance Minister Bob Richards said the concept, known as mutualisation, could provide economic empowerment to hundreds of government employees who would become shareholders and board members.

At a press conference yesterday, Mr Richards said that capitalism had triumphed over socialism because it had allowed “ordinary people” to act in their own economic self interest.

“What if we could find a way to unleash that wealth creating power, that efficiency creating power, that power delivered by intelligent balancing of risk versus reward,” the Minister asked.

“What if we could apply that attitude, that only comes from self interest, to some functions currently provided by the government and thereby make those services more user friendly, innovative, efficient and economical? What if we could?

“Indeed we can. It is called mutualisation. What is mutualisation? Mutualisation is a process by which a service, that is currently provided by the public sector, is spun off into a separate entity, but the staff employed by government providing the service move over to the new entity, not only as employees, but as shareholders of the new entity with representation on the board.”

Mr Richards said that employees would be given their shares free-of-charge by Government, which would retain some shareholding.

And he stressed that the concept was not a move to privatise Government services because the operating entities would be owned by staff.

He said the system had a successful five-year track record in the UK and “there has evolved a proven playbook on how to mutualise: what to do, and what not to do, to take this concept from an idea to success on the ground”.

“Mutualisation transforms employees into owners, with outstanding success in the UK. If the staff is unionised, they choose whether to keep their membership in the union after mutualisation, and many have done so.”

Mr Richards did not give a timeline for when the system could be introduced, pointing out that Government was not yet at the stage where it had selected “first candidates”.

“There has been much talk about economic empowerment over the years, but little concrete achievement,” he said.

“And we think that, at this time in our history, there could be a confluence of two opportunity streams — first, the opportunity to slim down Government, and second the opportunity for economic empowerment by way of mutualisation.”