New Children’s Hospital completion date delayed again

The completion date for the New Children’s Hospital has slipped again, with the board saying it has been told by the lead developer it will not be finished by the end of April.

Until this week, the latest date for substantial completion of the multi-billion-euro Dublin hospital had been April 30.

But the Oireachtas Health Committee was told on Wednesday this would not be met and there was currently no target date.

It is recognised as the 19th completion date for the major infrastructure project, which is being led by contractor BAM.

The serially-delayed project had an original completion date of August 2022 while costs have ballooned from a planned 650 million euro to an expected 2.2 billion euro.

David Gunning, chief officer of the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board, told TDs on Wednesday: “A meeting with the senior BAM team yesterday morning, March 24, confirmed that they would not deliver on their April 30 substantial completion (SC) date.

“This is obviously a huge disappointment as BAM has already delayed this SC date 18 times.

“However, while BAM is not achieving SC, BAM is advising us that they expect to have areas of the hospital completed by the end of April.”

Mr Gunning said the employer’s representative was in the process of writing to BAM to formally request an updated contract programme.

He said the contractor had 15 working days to respond to that, adding: “When we get that response, we will then understand what the new date is.”

A spokesman for BAM said it is “not accurate or constructive” to state it had “continuously missed completion dates”.

The company said the development programme has evolved in response to “instructed design changes” and “additional scope” during the project, with each updated completion date reflecting those changes rather than “any failure of performance”.

BAM said it works closely with the NPHDB and CHI to “deliver the hospital as quickly and safely as possible for the children of Ireland”.

Committee chairman and Social Democrats TD Padraig Rice said it was “certainly disappointing that the 18th deadline will be missed and we’ll move to a 19th deadline”.

Sinn Fein health spokesman David Cullinane said the development could not be described as a “bombshell” because “nobody believed that it was going to be met in the first instance”.

He said: “That’s just an illustration of how bad this process and how bad this project has been.

“It has been a disaster from start to finish, because we’re dealing with massive cost overruns, billions of euro in taxpayers’ money, 18 completion dates which have come and gone, design changes and all of the problems that we’ve had with the project, and fundamentally a flawed contract that was an absolute disaster.

“I hope we never see the likes of that contract again – and, bizarrely, it was a contract that was signed off on by the current Minister for Finance Simon Harris, which is even more bizarre.”

The committee also heard there were concerns about a noisy ventilation system which could threaten to disrupt clinical service, with the development board saying it was “very hard to determine” if this would cause delays to a handover.

Asked by Labour health spokeswoman Marie Sherlock if he had believed the April 30 completion date, Mr Gunning said he had “little confidence in the dates expressed by the contractor”.

He expressed concerns about the number of staff BAM was deploying to the site, which he said was “entirely a matter” for the contractor.

Mr Gunning said BAM had said there would be a peak of 1,700 on the site but the maximum it has ever achieved was around 1,250, before averaging around 560.

He said the contractor had “never achieved the required progress to deliver on timeline commitments” and “resourcing of the project remained a significant issue”.

Asked by Mr Rice if BAM had committed to increase staffing, Mr Gunning said the contractor maintained the project was sufficiently resourced, but this was not accepted by the board.

The committee chairman said it was “another flaw in the contract” that the board had no lever to pull on the staffing resources at the site.

BAM said the project is in the final stages of completion and commissioning, adding it “continues to be resourced to support the work currently under way”, with specialist teams continuing to complete the remaining programme.

After the completion of construction by main contractor BAM, the hospital will also require an estimated seven-month commissioning period before it is ready for use.

Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) has raised concerns about transporting patients in the higher-risk winter period.

CHI chief executive Lucy Nugent said: “As the prolongation of the substantial complete date and then the opening date pushes into, potentially, a winter period, we are looking at all options for opening this hospital as soon as possible.”

She added: “We continue to evaluate the situation, and when it comes to the actual day-one opening date, we will risk assess is it safe to do so.”