Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Taoiseach and Tánaiste told us there was a gross underestimate of the cost of building the hospital. Who underestimated it? Was it BAM? The contract was awarded on foot of a competition. BAM told the Government what it would cost. If there was a scope change, then the price would obviously go up, but if the scope was not determined, why did the Government go for a fixed price contract? It did not give the price to BAM. BAM gave the price to the Government. It is not an issue of underestimating the true cost of the project but an issue of awarding a contract at a fixed price and letting it escalate because the Government used the wrong contract. The Tánaiste said that we must recognise that a significant mistake was made in this process when costs and quantities were being estimated. Who estimated them? Did the Government do a public benchmarking analysis prior to tenders going out to contractors? If so, who did it? Do they have insurance and will they be held to account?

The Minister said a solid and explicit rationale had been put forward as far back as 2015 and that this was the right way to go. Was it? Who put it forward and will they be held to account? I have said before that we are not at the point of no return; we are only starting and right now the Government does not have a clue where the price is going to end up because of the form of contract being used. Unless it re-tenders, it will not know where it is going to finish.

The Taoiseach talked about other big contracts coming in within budget and on time and said we had done this before. What the Government forgets is that FIDIC, an international document, was used for those contracts but not for this one. We used a very poor Irish contract, the capital works management framework, in this case and only God knows why. The Taoiseach said it was not an issue of taxpayers' money being wasted. It is - hundreds of millions of euro. If the wrong form of contract is in place, costs are going out of control and the Government refuses to change the contract, I say it is wasting taxpayers' money. The legal advice on locating the children's hospital on the Mater hospital site was to stay away from the capital works management framework. Why, therefore, did McCann Fitzgerald advise the board to use the wrong form of contract on the James's Hospital site? Can the Government answer that question? Will anyone be held to account? Did the Government have no problem with the fact that there was a conflict of interest, that a member of McCann Fitzgerald was on the board? Was that okay? Why did the Government appoint PwC to review the fiasco? Was it procured and were procurement rules breached in its appointment? PwC is not independent. Does the Government know that it partially drafted the capital works management framework, the framework we are saying that is causing all of the problems? It had its paws on it and was involved in drafting it. Is it going to turn around and state its work was poor? We look forward to that one. I am sorry to say the truth is the Government has failed with the children's hospital project. It is losing hundreds of millions of euro because it failed to manage the process properly.

The notion that this is all the Minister's fault and that he should be held personally responsible is nonsense. I do not buy that, but I do think the Government should be held to account. How that is to be done, I am not sure, but the Government is calling for elections in Venezuela. There were elections held there last year and the opposition decided to boycott them because it knew that it would not win. Now President Trump is organising a coup there. We are the ones who need an election. Perhaps we are the ones with the dysfunctional democracy, not Venezuela.

I do not expect the Government to understand everything about contracts for construction, but I would expect it to hire the right advisers and do the right thing when problems arise. However, it is not doing so, at great cost to the people of Ireland. It is making a huge mistake in not re-tendering. It is a massive mistake. By the looks of it, the Government will carry on regardless. It is unfortunate that it has been given the opportunity to do so by the main party in opposition, which is really disappointing. While I might not agree with it, I understand the argument made about Brexit and that it cannot go there, but Deputy McGuinness' point is not the worst I have heard. Why do we not agree now to dissolve the Government at Easter and have an election afterwards? The manner in which the Government has failed on the children's hospital project is demoralising. It should not think it is good enough and it should re-think, although it might not look like the right thing to do. It is politically difficult to make that U-turn, but it is the right thing to do and it should do it.

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