Cormac Devlin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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In an ideal world, it would be someone from BAM sitting in Mr. Gunning’s seat. I am sure Mr. Gunning would love if someone from BAM were sitting in his seat, just as we would prefer to have someone from BAM in here. From what I am hearing - we also heard this at our previous engagement, as colleagues said earlier - the number of staff who have been allocated to this project has fluctuated, if I might put it that way. I am sure that is as frustrating for the board as it is for us, and indeed for the public and the Department. Everyone is ad idem here about wanting this hospital complete, but it is dragging on. The costs are extremely worrying. They were worrying when they went up initially. When I was a new Member in this House, I questioned whether we were talking about a children’s hospital costing in excess of €2 billion. I was told at that time that such a proposition could not be verified. We are now well in excess of that figure, which is very concerning.

Earlier on, Mr. Devine made the point following questions from colleagues that the tender put out initially was quite generic. I think this was in relation to exit signs, emergency lighting and other items that are required in the build. Am I correct in saying that when one goes beyond the generic need for product X, Y and Z and gets to specifics, the costs change? Do we have a problem with the State procurement and tendering process? In Mr. Devine’s view, is that ultimately where these costs went out of control?