Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 5 October 2022

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health

Construction of the National Children’s Hospital: Discussion

Mr. David Gunning:

I will start with the Chairman's invitation to pay compliment to the residents. He is right they have been very patient. We value the local community's participation and commitment. There has been much engagement with the residents through the residents' project monitoring committee, which was set up by the development board in co-operation with the local residents. It is also a good opportunity to point out the community benefit fund that was put in place by BAM. Contributions go to local charities and activities from the project to try to ensure there is a value-add in the local area from the fact the project is continuing. There are also the efforts to ensure and try to drive employment within the project and ultimately the hospital for the local community in this new hospital which is quite significant on the skyline. I thank the Chairman for the opportunity to do that.

On the compound, there is an appendix to the contract that has it. We will share that calculation with the committee and do so shortly. I ask Dr. Curtis to deal with the question on ICU beds and that particular issue.

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