Verona Murphy (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

As a member of the Committee of Public Accounts, I am pleased to have the opportunity to support and speak on this motion. I commend all those who worked on compiling the report, including the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General, the committee secretariat, my colleagues on the committee, the Chairman, Deputy Stanley, and the witnesses who appeared before us. The Committee of Public Accounts met with the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board on two occasions, on 9 February 2021 and 13 July 2021. The committee then published a report on these two meetings in March of this year. The report contained a number of recommendations. The board was requested to provide an update in respect of each of the relevant recommendations. No updates were received by close of business on 15 June 2022. The fact that no updates were received illustrates the difficulty many members of the committee have faced in trying to get information from members of the board. It has been frustrating to say the least.

The first recommendation was that they publish a report on the timeline and cost of the national paediatric hospital. The Department of Health refused on the basis that this information was commercially sensitive. During the two meetings with the board on the dates previously referred to, I also received non-answers to questions, citing the commercial sensitivity of the project as the reason for not answering. At the second meeting on 13 July I said the following:

There is a vacuum in transparency and accountability with regard to the project. There have not been any real answers from the board representatives this morning. I appreciate that we can have commercial sensitivity, but we can take it too far. I believe the board is taking the interpretation in the broadest possible sense in respect of commercial sensitivity. As a member of the committee I believe the information being requested is in the public interest.

Per bed, this project is on course to be the most expensive hospital ever built in the history of humanity. Not only will it be the most expensive hospital ever built, it looks like it could end up being over two times more expensive than the second most expensive hospital ever built, per bed. Yet, members of the Committee of Public Accounts were continually fobbed off when trying to get to the bottom of the matter. At the board's last appearance in front of the committee, it was heavily criticised by the Vice Chair, Deputy Catherine Murphy, who said the board's attitude of indifference to the committee had to be addressed and that we had a job to do. Mr. Gunning noted those remarks and said he took them on board and would ensure everything possible would be done in the future to address the issues raised. That lasted for all of about 40 minutes as I asked a straightforward question which Mr Gunning failed to answer.

Inflation is one area of concern that is having a major impact, not just on the cost of living. It will also have a major impact on the cost of this project. I questioned the members of the board about the inflation clause in the contract. I was informed by Mr. Gunning, "There is an inflation clause in the contract. It states that construction inflation above 4% becomes a cost the State will bear and below 4% it is the contractor's responsibility." Mr. Devine further stated, "It is based on an average of three published tender inflation indices from Linesight, AECOM and the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland." I asked Mr. Devine if he believed that figure of 4% was a little low, given that at the time construction price inflation was at 7%. I was told, "The 4% figure was the result of detailed analysis we did back in 2016 when we issued the job out to tender." Unfortunately, it looks like our current inflation predicament may result in the taxpayer having to pick up the tab for even more overruns.

With regard to the project as a whole, I have some sympathy for the Minister of State and the Minister for Health. He has been handed a poisoned chalice and he has had to oversee the mess created. The contract and design were started when the Tánaiste, Deputy Leo Varadkar, was Minister for Health and the construction of the project began when the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, Deputy Harris, was Minister for Health. The Government has been hiding the cost of the hospital and the huge difficulties with it from the public. It has gone from €600 million to €1.5 billion. I remember Deputy Varadkar, saying that short of an asteroid hitting the planet the hospital will be finished in 2020. Those are not my words they are the words of our current Tánaiste in January 2020. Two and a half years on, the cost difficulties are getting worse. It looks like it may be at least 2024 before the hospital sees a patient. It is as difficult as ever to get a proper picture of what is actually going on, although I for one, as a member of the Committee of Public Accounts, will keep trying.

Mr. Gunning and Mr. Devine also assured the committee that the budget to fit out this hospital was still at €300 million. I do not see how that is possible if inflation, which is already above 4%, will apparently be paid in and around the 10% mark. How can the budget of €300 million to kit out the hospital stay at that level? It is time we got a proper figure that reflects the reality.I do not blame the war in Ukraine for this. There have been delays of a very serious nature. Of course, we could not have predicted Covid but we had templates such as other projects around the world that saw very serious delays and the doubling of project costs. It was a serious error to keep our inflation level at 4% in the contracts, particularly when it was at 7% last year. The Exchequer is now paying seriously for that mistake.

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