Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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695. To ask the Minister for Health with regard to the proposed site of the National Children’s Hospital, the net additional cost of transitioning the entirety of St. James’s Hospital, including the proposed maternity hospital, net of higher costs of building on the St. James’s site, net of the estimated costs associated with the building of the new maternity hospital on the site, net the cost of upgrading the Connolly site, to the Connolly site; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13157/16]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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€650m has been made available in Exchequer funding for the new children's hospital project, demonstrating the commitment of both the previous Government and this Government to the project. The 2014 estimate for the project, as set out in the approved Project Brief, affirmed delivery of the core hospital, including both satellite centres, within this envelope. The estimate includes provision for inflation, VAT and contingencies. It does not include equipment or ICT which can be purchased, licensed or leased separately. Philanthropic and commercial funding streams are to be targeted as appropriate for supporting elements of the project to include car parking and research facilities. As with any capital project, it is essential that cost estimates be reviewed and refined as appropriate, including making prudent provision for construction inflation. Ultimately, costs for the new children's hospital project at the St James's campus, and the satellite centres at the Connolly and Tallaght campuses, will be determined during the tendering process, which is expected to be very competitive, with significant interest from contractors.

The cost of transitioning the new children's hospital to a site at or adjacent to Connolly Hospital has not been assessed in any detail, as no such project exists. It is of course well understood that construction costs on a greenfield site are likely to be less than on an urban site and this was addressed in the 2012 Dolphin report, and in the further analysis sought by the Minister for Health to inform the Government decision on the location of the hospital. However, transition of the new children's hospital from the current site at St James's to any other site would require the abandonment of the current project, for which planning permission has now been secured and in relation to which tenders for enabling works contract have been received by the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB). As well as re-opening planning risk for this much-needed hospital, a new site would mean that costs incurred to date would be likely to be, in the main, written off. More importantly, the new hospital would be significantly delayed; based on the experience at both the Mater campus and the St James's campus, it is likely that if the hospital were to move to a third site, a period of three to four years would elapse before a planning decision was received. Only then would construction begin, subject to a favourable planning decision. This much longer timeline would mean that construction inflation would be likely to have a significant impact on project costs. Together with lost expenditure on the project to date, that could offset much if not all of any savings to be obtained from building on a greenfield site.

The previous Government's decision on the location of the new children's hospital was not determined by construction cost, but by clinical considerations. The fundamental aim of this vital project is to ensure the best possible health outcomes for children and young people in Ireland. As announced in July 2015, it is intended that the Coombe Women and Infants University Hospital will relocate to the St James's campus in time, achieving tri-location of paediatric, maternity and adult services on one campus. Tri-location has benefits for children, adolescents, newborns and mothers. In all cases, the benefits of tri-location are maximised where the adult hospital provides the broadest possible range of clinical sub-specialties and expertise, and delivers significant breadth and depth of clinical and academic research on site. St James's Hospital has the widest range of sub-specialties and highest level of clinical complexity of all hospitals in the country, as well as a strong and well-developed research infrastructure, making it the hospital that best meets the criteria to be the adult co-location partner.

A significant upgrade of Connolly Hospital would be required to achieve the same quality of clinical outcomes as co-location/tri-location with St James’s. As set out in the Dolphin report, Connolly Hospital would need very substantial investment of human and capital resources to develop over time into an adult tertiary hospital with critical mass supported by leading edge research facilities, additional to the capital cost of developing the children's hospital itself on the campus.