The Minister for Health has promised that the company contracted to build the new National Maternity Hospital is more “reliable” than BAM, who are building the National Children’s Hospital.
Construction on the National Children’s Hospital began in 2016, during Simon Harris’ tenure as Minister for Health, but is still incomplete a decade on.
The cost has also ballooned from an original estimate of €650 million to €2.2 billion, making it one of the most expensive hospitals in the history of humanity.
Amid concerns that the National Maternity Hospital will suffer similar delays and inflationary costs, Jennifer Carroll MacNeill said an “enormous amount” of preparatory work has already been completed into the design and finances.
“It's been independently reviewed to find the right preferred contractor,” she explained on Newstalk Breakfast.
“Having a very long period with them going through the design, making sure that everybody understands what they're doing, knowing where our supply chains are, knowing the number of people that are going to be there and getting to the best point of certainty that we can for this project.
“Also, you'll be aware that there's a lot of enabling works that have already taken place on St Vincent's, which means that the contractor can move into the site now in the early part of 2027 on a clean site.”
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The construction contract has been awarded to a company called John Sisk & Son, who have promised to complete the €1.86 billion project by 2033.
Minister Carroll MacNeill acknowledged that the cost was significant but praised Sisk as a “reliable contractor”.
“This is the cost that the market says is there at the moment,” she said.
“We went out to market with an independently verified design.
“It is expensive to build health care; there are not that many contractors in the market.
“We have a very good contractor now with Sisk, who we've worked within the health care space before, who delivered the, for example, the 96 bed block in Limerick.
“And we're very pleased with that.”
Construction of the new National Children's Hospital in Dublin. Picture by: BAM Ireland.When asked if BAM had been blocked from the National Maternity Hospital contract, Minister Carroll MacNeill said that was not the case in “any sense” and that it had been tendered as an “open project”.
She added that Sisk has simply delivered a “very realistic programme” and preparatory work is now well underway.
“They're looking for clarity and certainty on some of the design elements, clarity around some of the supply chain processes,” she said.
“[The HSE] sat down in a really collaborative way with this contractor over the last six to eight months to work out all of the fine details of not just what the contract is, but how it's going to be delivered and how many people are going to be there.”
Construction of the National Maternity Hospital is expected to begin next year.
Main image: Jennifer Carroll MacNeill speaking to the media outside Government Buildings. Picture by: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews.ie.
