Children's hospital cost to impact OPW projects
Office of Public Works projects will be the first to face the cut as the Government tries to make up for escalating overruns on the National Children’s Hospital.
The finance minister has told departments he may adjust their capital budgets as €100m must be found to address the escalating hospital costs, with the OPW being told it will have around €3m taken from its allocation.
As Health Minister Simon Harris faced calls to resign, Paschal Donohoe has moved to claw back €100m from projects earmarked for this year. He will bring a memo to Cabinet on Tuesday.
A tranche of documents released by the Department of Health this week revealed that Mr Harris was told about a €191m overspend on the hospital construction, as well as an additional €200m claim submitted by contractors BAM in August.
Sinn Féin president Mary Lou McDonald said Mr Harris’ position is untenable and that Fianna Fáil needs to “stop protecting the minister for health”.
She wrote to Micheál Martin asking him to back its motion of no confidence in Mr Harris, while the Labour Party demanded to know what the Government told Fianna Fáil ahead of the last budget about the hospital cost overrun.
Mr Martin said Mr Harris needs to “correct the Dáil and he needs to apologise to the Dáil” for not providing full information on the cost overruns. He called for the release of all documents relating to the hospital and all briefings the minister received on the cost escalations.
However, he said it is “easy to put down motions and a minister can resign” and there is a danger that the full facts may not emerge if a minister was forced out of office.
“The chapter cannot close on this prematurely in terms of the truth coming out,” said Mr Martin.
However, on RTÉ’s Drivetime Fianna Fáil Sligo TD Marc MacSharry called on his party to “terminate” the confidence and supply agreement with Fine Gael and demand that Mr Harris quit.
Speaking in Belfast, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said he had “absolute confidence” in Mr Harris.
Meanwhile, Mr Donohoe is to bring a list of projects that will be directly impacted to Cabinet on Tuesday, with everything from the cath lab in Waterford to the national radiation oncology programme in Cork, as well as schools and road projects expected to be considered for postponement. However, the Taoiseach yesterday said this would be “manageable”, pointing to the fact that the increase in the capital budget for 2019 was €1.5bn.
OPW Minister Kevin ‘Boxer’ Moran was yesterday ordered not to appear before the finance committee next week, as the amount he will have to spend on capital projects this year will change.
The OPW wrote to the finance committee yesterday morning stating
that
it had been advised that their revised estimate “will be adjusted in the coming weeks”.
“I understand that a memorandum will go to Government on Tuesday on the National Children’s Hospital which may propose a change in a number of departmental allocations for 2019,” the letter to the committee stated. “In the event that the memorandum is agreed by Government the OPW Revised Estimate may change.
“In light of the above, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has asked that the consideration of the OPW estimate by the Select Committee on Finance, scheduled for February 12 is postponed to allow for the Revised Estimates to reissue to Departments.”
Committee chairman John McGuinness turned down this request, stating Mr Moran must still appear.
Numerous departments last night refused to say if there have been direct discussions on adjusting their budgets, with a number stating that Mr Donohoe would be dealing with the issue next week “with a view to determining how the additional costs can be accommodated within the existing envelope and within the minimum of disruption to project delivery”.
