State to meet cladding cost
CAIRNS Hospital officials have given assurances that not a cent of health service funding will be used to remove potentially combustible cladding from one of their buildings.
Independent testing of cladding on blocks D and E of Cairns Hospital has found both buildings to be of low risk of fire, but health officials say the material will still be replaced from E block as a precaution.
Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Service acting infrastructure director Michael Miller said the tested panels from E block, which contains the Liz Plummer Cancer Centre and the hospital paid carpark, contained high levels of flammable polyethelene.
“To help minimise the potential risk to patients and staff, the health service will undertake a series of operational management changes over the next two weeks, such as installing bollards near the street parking on Lake St,” he said.
“We will work with our staff to ensure that patient services will not be interrupted throughout the removal and replacement process.”
The hospital was among 44 buildings statewide investigated by the State Government’s audit taskforce for potentially combustible cladding.
The audit was a response to London’s Grenfell Tower disaster, which claimed the lives of 72 people and injured at least 70 on June 14.
Health service chief financial officer Steve Thacker said there would be no cost to the service from the cladding re- moval. “This is a government wide issue,” he said. “Because the Queensland Government set the (cladding audit) taskforce up, they have agreed to underwrite the costs of the replacement (cladding) for all buildings,” he said.
In June last year, Queensland Health assured the Cairns Post the cladding was safe.
Mr Thacker said this was not premature advice.
“The original compliance checks of the buildings, as they were built and the regulations at the time – that advice was true,” he said.
“Since the taskforce has moved on and provided its recommendations … that’s what has led us to now identifying specific elements of cladding to be replaced.”
No other CHHHS buildings have been identified as having potential risky cladding.
The Cairns Performing Arts Centre, which opened last weekend, also has cladding issues.
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PATIENTS at Cairns Hospital will be dining like kings this Christmas.
The hospital is putting on a special menu in celebration of the holiday period, including traditional meals such as ham off the bone, roast lamb and plum pudding, through to tropical dishes like fish with mango salsa and pavlova.
Hospital food services manager Alan Seacombe said they wanted to make sure patients did not miss out on celebrating the festive season.
“The food services staff all look forward to working on Christmas Day and we’ll have three chefs and 28 food service assistants delivering 1200 meals for patients and up to 800 staff meals,” he said. “Three diet aides and three supervisors will also be on hand to ensure the service runs as smoothly as Santa Claus’ schedule.”