Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Thank you, very much, Chairman. I apologise for the bells in the background. I am substituting for Senator Black, who would like to be here herself if she could.

We have heard from the Minister that the legal advice is that the expected life of a hospital is 50 years to 60 years. There is an embodied emissions concern about such a short lifecycle for a building, but we also heard that the requirement is that maternity health services would be continued on this site for 299 years. This is something important which has not got the necessary focus and it would merit elaboration. While the rent is currently set at €850,000 per year, which is close to €1 million per year, it is waived to be €10 per year, so long as the permitted use, which is subject to the double constraints of being clinically appropriate and legally permissible, continues. The Minister tells us the hospital is only to last for 60 years, so what happens after that? Are we effectively committing to building four or five new maternity hospitals in a row on this site and, if we do not do so, will we become liable for €850,000 or €1 million per year in rent for the site? It is one or the other. Either way, both raise significant financial concerns.

There has been talk about the many grounds pertaining to the St. Vincent's Healthcare Group, as the landlord, such that it may be able to seek a forfeiture in relation to the lease, but if the State decides 100 years in that we do want to build a new national maternity hospital that is an actual public hospital - publicly owned on public land - where is our exit and what are the liabilities that would come with such an exit from the lease? I would like the Minister to comment on those legal issues, and he might also come back on the question of permitted use and the terms "clinically appropriate" and "legally permissible". I will get the answer to the leasehold and rent question first and then I will come back on the question of permitted use.