Seán Kyne (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for the response. The only concrete date there is for the opening of the interim emergency department at the end of June 2022. Other than that, there are a lot of words I have heard before. Some are new, such as the phrases "strategic assessment report" and "external assurance process". They do not fill me with hope about the delivery of the project. I am afraid, as I said last time, that the project is going backwards.

The costs were originally less because the project was on a smaller scale. I welcome the admission of the Department in relation to the HSE to ramp it up to include maternity services and paediatrics. Before this, it was a shell and core project. A detailed design of the project was then carried out which pushed the figure into the €275 million to €300 million category. I appreciate there are processes but this does not fill me with hope about when we will get a solution, when a planning application will be lodged and when the process can go towards the long, complicated process of tender documents, contractors being appointed and construction. It is still years away. I wish I could say, as we start the month of May, that a planning application will be lodged before the end of the summer or in the autumn, but I am not getting that from the Minister of State's response.