An interesting point was made by Vince Cable on the radio yesterday - the Govt don't have specialist contract negotiators/writers (I believe we used to once upon a time) - the French have an academy for that specialisation, properly trained people with experience in due diligence and finance.
As a country we still haven't learned the warning about 'not putting all your eggs in one basket' and continue to believe that economies of scale work, both militarily or financially - that is how you create behemoths that are 'too big to fail'.
Couple that with a desire from both major parties to move things off the treasury balance sheet - welcome the PFI fiasco - and it's no surprise we have ended up here.