## 5 Conclusions  
Social infrastructure PPPs continue to play an important role in the early provision of facilities and enhanced services yet there remains a gap in the direct feedback that end-users have on the contract. There remains a gap in how feedback and expectations of end-users are considered by PPP contract managers and the lack of tools and processes to support decision-makers when evaluating requests to vary or modify PPP agreements. Current performance evaluations of the social PPPs (e.g., schools and hospitals) are dominated by the use of KPIs. Benchmark comparisons have focused on time, quality and cost performance during construction and there remain weaknesses in how to appropriately measure service performance outcomes during operations. In the present study, a reliability-based decision support framework (RDSF) is developed by integrating specific performance of a PPP contract \(A(t)\) with the perceived performance achieved and \(P(t)\) over a project's life cycle from the end-user's perspective. It was tested on observed service outcomes from three PPP schools in Australia. The following are some major findings:  
* It demonstrates the developed RDSF could potentially provide guidance for developing performance and improvement strategies in the context of uncertainty. * Interestingly, for the schools analysed, the results accord with anecdotal evidence provided in the survey and interviews that nine years into the contract the PPP agreement was performing well. The result of probability of failure \(P_{f,t}\) of 0.1% at \(t~{}=~{}9\) supports good service performance in the case example schools. For long-term performance prediction, acceptable service performance of 17% was obtained when projecting to 25 years. * The \(P_{f,t}\) may increase with longer operation years mainly owing to concerns of limited space if enrolment numbers increase. In this case, building additional rooms to satisfy the end-user's need for space could improve service performance, thus achieving long-term value for money in PPP operations. Therefore, the government should acknowledge the need for flexibility over long-term contracts to deal with potential major changes. * The social PPPs performance assessment needs to consider the end-user's perception into decisions to improve performance and assess the uncertainties of project key parameters. The test showed that the RDSF has merit and is achievable using data that are reasonably obtained from social infrastructure PPP contracts. The application of this analytic approach has, first, considered the end-user's perception of social PPPs into decisions to improve performance, and then assessed uncertainty using reliability analysis. The aforementioned findings enable the direct consideration of probability of the social PPPs not meeting the end-user's expected outcomes, termed of 'probability of failure'. Figure 8: Reliability analysis for PPP schools in Australia case example at t = 25. Contributions in theory and practice are offered in the context of social PPPs. In theory, the RDSF, which could potentially enable the engagement of end-user in social PPP operations, can evaluate service performance as a form of 'probability of failure'. This addresses the research gap identified in Figure 1, enriches theories in the field of performance management system (PMS), and also contributes to knowledge regarding an evidence-based test for justifying possible agreement modifications or additional works in social PPPs operations. In practice, the RDSF incorporates end-user's perceived service quality on space, operation and maintenance activities of PPP social infrastructure projects to further deal with the end-user's need to improve performance as a managerial decision-making tool. The improvements in perspective of the end-user's dissatisfied area will close the gap between the end-user's expectations and contractual obligations (i.e., Gap 1 in Figure 1).