We’re in Father Ted territory now
Minister and his top official say it took a month to set up crucial finance meeting
SENIOR health officials spent a whole month seeking a meeting with the Department of Public Expenditure about the escalating cost of the new National Children’s Hospital, it has emerged.
Health Minister Simon Harris and his Secretary General Jim Breslin confirmed to the Oireachtas Health Committee yesterday that they made attempts to discuss the overruns with Public Expenditure officials last October. However they said it was several weeks before they got sitting around the table to discuss the matter.
This delay, which ‘beggars belief’, was branded as ‘Father Ted territory’ by Labour TD Alan Kelly.
Mr Harris told the committee he was not aware of the soaring costs until he began negotiations with Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe ahead of Budget 2019.
Mr Breslin told the committee it was early September 2018 when he and Mr Harris were made aware of the ‘potential of an emerging problem’. He said they subsequently made contact with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform (DPER) in October, ‘not saying what the detail of the issue was, but saying we would like a meeting on the issue’.
Mr Breslin also said that prior to October, officials in the Department of Health ‘would have contacted DPER to say can we arrange a meeting to sit down and go through the emerging situation that we have’.
He told the committee yesterday that ‘in terms of the interaction with DPER, it was very much and no more than “we would like a meeting with you on this”, and there was then a time lag’.
While Mr Breslin said it was November 9 before they had ‘good information’ of the extent of the overrun and a written report from the hospital development board the following week, he also said he believed the reason the meeting did not happen in October was due to ‘scheduling’.
He said: ‘I think there was obviously a very busy time in terms of the Budget and estimate cycle – it just wasn’t possible to put the meeting together in October.’
But, Mr Kelly said it was worthy of Father Ted that there was ‘not an awareness across the two departments that this is absolutely a huge issue and you could not have a meeting’.
A spokesman for Finance Minister Mr Donohoe said last night the meeting was delayed because they were waiting for a report from the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board on the cost overrun and the reasons for it.
Oireachtas committees were previously told non-specification of quantities for some of the constrcution materials was one of several reasons for the cost overrun.
While concerns around cost pressures emerged in 2017, Mr Harris told the committee yesterday he was not aware of the scale of the spiralling overruns for a year.
In answer to a question from Fianna Fáil’s Stephen Donnelly, Mr Harris said he believed the hospital’s €1.4billion price tag was ‘reasonable’ but he wished it could be cheaper.
He told the committee an ‘early warning system’ would have helped significantly with costs, but insisted ‘intensive’ work has been going on since his department was made aware of the overspend.
Mr Harris said he was ‘somewhat frustrated at the characterisation that ‘the minister knew in August and nothing happened until November’, and that ‘nothing could be further from the truth’.
‘The paper trail that you have and testimony that you have from my officials, from members of the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board, from the HSE and indeed from my own mouth at this committee last week, show that not to be the case,’ he said.
The Government approved a price of €983million for the hospital in 2017, but last December it confirmed this had reached €1.4billion. Once computer and other costs are included this will push the cost to €1.7billion.
Mr Harris told the committee the Department of Public Expenditure was informed last October – yet Mr Donohoe was not told for another month.
Sinn Féin’s Pearse Doherty said senior HSE and Health officials on the hospital’s steering group had been flagging the soaring costs since October 2017 and almost every month after that, but Mr Harris ‘still maintains he was not informed or made aware of the costs overrun until August 2018’.
He said Mr Harris ‘did not open his mouth for three months’.
Down to busy scheduling Wished it could be cheaper
‘It is utter madness, and shows the dysfunctionality in those departments and at the heart of the Government.’
A Department of Health spokesman said the hospital Steering Group does not report to Mr Harris: ‘In relation to the reporting of the cost escalation… Mr Harris… was first advised by department officials in September 2017 of a costs estimate increase of €61million… with assurance that developments were being carefully managed.
‘The National Paediatric Hospital Development Board was advised to identify savings within its approved capital budget and seek to offset the potential cost increases through a variety of measures with a view to managing the project within approved parameters. It was the subject of detailed discussion and intensive monitoring through 2017 and 2018.
‘As the Minister has also clearly stated, he next learned of potential escalation of costs on August 27, 2018.
‘On completion of the Guaranteed Maximum Price process in November the Minister was briefed on November 9 on the emerging position. The Secretary General was made aware of the final figure on November 9, on the same day as the Minister.’ emmajane.hade@dailymail.ie