THE DUBLIN CIVIC Trust, one of the groups who objected to planning permission for the Rotunda Hospital critical care unit for women and infants, has said it would not go to court if judicial review was sought against the decision.

Dublin Civic Trust objected to the new wing on the grounds it would damage the 18th century city-centre square and the long-term prospects for regeneration once the hospital eventually moved to Blanchardstown under plans. 

The new building on the Rotunda site was to include 80 additional hospital rooms and a new operating theatre. 

There has been strong backlash against An Coimisiún Pleanála’s decision to prevent construction of the €100 million facility.

The Minister for Health said she is “deeply disappointed”, while the Irish Medical Organisation said the decision will “jeopardise the wellbeing of many women and their infant children”. Meanwhile, the Master of the Rotunda Hospital said it should remain at its current site in north Dublin and be allowed to develop further.

Speaking on Morning Ireland today, Graham Hickey of the Dublin Civic Trust described the situation as a “fiasco”.

He said the expansion of the Rotunda, even a scaled back version, is “inherently incompatible” with Parnell Square.

“We need to look at this with cool heads and stand back from this current mess. This is a fiasco,” he said, adding that opportunities to move the Rotunda to locations such as the Mater hospital must be examined.

“Parnell Square is the most extraordinary landscape. It’s probably the most significant Georgian square, or place in Dublin City, in terms of the interaction of the major neoclassical public buildings of the Rotunda hospital, but also the enclosing flank of all of the surrounding houses, which are all protected structures in their own right,” he said.

In appealing Dublin City Council’s permission to build the unit, An Coimisiún Pleanála agreed with appellants that the current proposal would not protect the architectural design of Parnell Square. 

However, when asked today if the Dublin Civic Trust would go to court if the Rotunda sought a judicial review against the decision, Hickey said “we certainly wouldn’t”.

“We are not an agitating entity.”

Speaking on the same show this morning, Minister for Health, Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, said the government would support the Master of the Rotunda, Professor Sean Daly, “as best appropriate” if he chose to take a judicial review application against the decision.

She said she will be meeting with the Master two weeks from now, when they have both considered the legal options available.

“Certainly I would be considering everything from my perspective and from the state’s perspective,” she said.

“The Master’s concern, as is my concern, is the delivery of a neonatal unit that is sufficient for the needs of the critically unwell children and the critical premature children that need to use it.”