Mr. Jim Breslin:

In the engagements we have had and in the briefing note we provided last week, we highlighted the two issues raised by Deputy Brassil. The price put on the increase in quantities is €115 million, of which €27 million is the statutory element - the fire works and so on.

Therefore that could perhaps be taken off. One can see the scale of the increase in quantities that has taken place there and in the omissions from it; it is €20 million. Those two things combined are really sizeable in explaining what is happening. They probably underestimate it because they knock on into the programme and the preliminaries, and how long it will take to execute the project. Further increases result from the overall increase in scale. I agree with the Deputy that a very serious question remains to be asked as to how the order of magnitude of increase could have taken place albeit from a preliminary design to a final design. How could it have been out by so much? When we asked the question of the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board in the context of finalising it, it was of the view that the design team and others were not at fault. However, in December the Government made a decision to request an independent review by PwC of this process to see where any of those omissions or increases could have been avoided and whose responsibility it might have been to do so and if they carried out those responsibilities.