New Children’s Hospital completion date delayed again
By Cillian Sherlock, Press Association
The completion date for the new Children’s Hospital has slipped again, with the board saying it has been told by the lead developer it will not be finished by the end of April.
Until this week, the latest date for substantial completion of the multi-billion-euro Dublin hospital had been April 30th.
But the Oireachtas Health Committee was told on Wednesday that this would not be met and there was currently no target date.
It is recognised as the 19th completion date for the major infrastructure project, which is being led by contractor BAM.
The serially delayed project had an original completion date of August 2022, while costs have ballooned from a planned €650 million to an expected €2.2 billion.
David Gunning, chief officer of the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board, told TDs on Wednesday: “A meeting with the senior BAM team yesterday morning, March 24th, confirmed that they would not deliver on their April 30th substantial completion (SC) date.
“This is obviously a huge disappointment, as BAM has already delayed this SC date 18 times.
“And however, while BAM is not achieving SC, BAM is advising us that they expect to have areas of the hospital completed by the end of April.”
Mr Gunning said the employer’s representative was in the process of writing to BAM to formally request an updated contract programme.
He said the contractor had 15 working days to respond to that, adding: “When we get that response, we will then understand what the new date is.”
Committee chairman and Social Democrats TD Padraig Rice said it was “certainly disappointing that the 18th deadline will be missed and we’ll move to a 19th deadline”.
Sinn Féin health spokesman David Cullinane said the development could not be described as a “bombshell” because “nobody believed that it was going to be met in the first instance”.
He said: “That’s just an illustration of how bad this process and how bad this project has been.
“It has been a disaster from start to finish, because we’re dealing with massive cost overruns, billions of euro in taxpayers’ money, 18 completion dates which have come and gone, design changes and all of the problems that we’ve had with the project, and fundamentally a flawed contract that was an absolute disaster.
“I hope we never see the likes of that contract again – and bizarrely, it was a contract that was signed off on by the current Minister for Finance Simon Harris, which is even more bizarre.”
The committee also heard there were concerns about a noisy ventilation system which could threaten to disrupt clinical service, with the devleopment board saying it was “very hard to determine” if this would cause delays to a handover.
After the completion of construction by main contractor BAM, the hospital will also require an estimated seven-month commissioning period before it is ready for use.
But Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) has raised concerns about transporting patients in the higher-risk winter period.
CHI chief executive Lucy Nugent said: “As the prolongation of the substantial complete date and then the opening date pushes into, potentially, into a winter period, so we are looking at all options for opening this hospital as soon as possible.
“So for example, we will be looking at how the flu season in the southern hemisphere is, how it would potentially play out for us in the winter, we’re looking at vaccination rates.
“We have also partnered with a lot of other hospitals around the world who have moved. So far, we have had engaged one hospital in Norway who actually moved in the winter of November last year.
“However, they weren’t moving on the scale and size that we were, it was a small unit.”
She said: “We continue to evaluate the situation, and when it comes to the actual day-one opening date, we will risk assess is it safe to do so.”
