This chapter appears in a collection of pieces on an aspect of society under New Labour which has received scant attention from social scientists: namely, the character of work under welfare reform. It takes forward our understanding of the experiential dimensions of the restructuring of the state and embedding of global capital by analysing two qualitative data sets to explore the interconnectedness of new governance arrangements, conditions of work and service quality in the context of new PFI hospitals. It offers a critically informed discussion of the potential and limitations of individual and collective worker-based challenges to service restructuring.