Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 27 October 2016

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health

National Paediatric Hospital: Discussion

9:00 am

Photo of Billy KelleherBilly Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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My final question is for Mr. Pollock. In the previous session Dr. Jimmy Sheehan referred to the construction. However, I did not need him to reference it, because it is something that continues to bother me a good deal. We are very good at building but we are very slow. Let us consider this street. We have been digging up the street for the Luas. The stretch is not 500 m but we are a long time at it. While we have great expertise in the area of design and so on, I take the view that build management is an area where we let ourselves down from time to time. Has the development board carried out forward planning in terms of the exact type of equipment that will be going in, and all that flows from that? Such planning is essential, rather than carrying out the construction first and then assembling the parts of the hospital to fit equipment and so on. That has been the case in some of our major projects in previous times. We have not always covered ourselves in glory. Has the development board seamlessly planned right through to the end? Will the hospital be fitted out as it is built? Will it all be done in time and on budget?