THE CONTRACTOR FOR the New Children’s Hospital has categorically rejected “any allegations of under-performance and under-resourcing” on the project, after the hospital’s board called its progress “unacceptable” today.
BAM building claimed that it is the hospital board that are responsible for the overall delivery of the hospital, and that the “persistent change to the hospital’s design” has complicated the job of giving a new completion date.
The company further said that any suggestion that it is “slowing down delivery of the hospital” is untrue, after David Gunning, the Chief Officer of the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB) clearly stated before the Oireachtas Health Committee that he believed this was the case.
Gunning also said that BAM “is not providing sufficient resources to deliver the hospital”, and did not submit progress reports for four months of this year.
The health committee heard that just 27 of the planned 3,000 rooms in the hospital have been completed, and that they all have snags which need to be fixed.
The board further stated that they cannot give the public a fixed date for the hospital to be completed, as they are waiting for BAM to submit a plan, which has to be deemed as compliant before it is released.
BAM has rejected many of the claims made by the board, and insisted that its staff are working “tirelessly” to drive the build phase of the project to “more than 85% completion”.
The company claimed that the “additional work” generated by revisions of the hospital’s design is not reflected in the board’s claim that BAM has only completed 67% of its planned activity in the last year.
“As noted by the Board, we have offered up more than 600 rooms for design team inspection and this number is increasing by the week. This is in line with the number indicated in the most recent programme progress update,” the company stated.
BAM said that it has been in continuous communication with the board, and will keep it “fully appraised” of any future challenges that arise in the build.
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