Sinn Féin spokesperson on Health, David Cullinane TD, has said that reports that operationally-ready transition plans are not in place for move to the new Children’s Hospital are “highly concerning” given that the project is already five years delayed.

Teachta Cullinane called for Children’s Health Ireland to present its transition plans and preparation for moving to the new Children’s Hospital to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health.

He said that there is no excuse for robust provisional plans to not be in place given that the hospital was expected to be handed over this summer.

Teachta Cullinane said:

“It is highly concerning to learn that transition plans for moving to the new Children’s Hospital are not up to scratch. This report appears to call into question the ability of Children’s Health Ireland to effectively deliver the new hospital when built, despite years of delay.

“It casts doubts over whether there is even a transition plan we can have confidence in, and expresses fears of gaps in staffing, senior leadership, and lack of clarity on the future operating model and resourcing of the new hospital.

“Even more seriously, reports of substandard clinical governance arrangements are alarming. Children’s Health Ireland is already under intense scrutiny for failures in clinical governance, and is the subject of a number of audits and reviews. This will ring alarm bells for parents of children on long waiting lists, particularly those of children with scoliosis and spina bifida who have been failed already.

“Planning for the move will naturally be disrupted by the shifting timelines of the new hospital, but that does not change the fact that commissioning and operational plans must be developed extensively before the hospital is handed over.

“It is essential that a robust transition plan is in place at this point to ensure that sufficient staff are available and deployed to open this new hospital as quickly as possible. We already know it will take at least six to nine months from handover for the hospital to be fully operational, and potentially longer.

“The lack of an operationally-ready transition plan is a major failing of the Minister for Health and the Taoiseach. The hospital was expected to be open to patients this summer. They are standing over a system that is subject to reviews and audits and which is not fit for purpose.

“They seem to be doing very little to bring urgency to a situation where children and their parents are fighting battle after battle. The hospital development is beset with cost overruns and delays, and now substandard transition plans are casting further doubt on the opening of this hospital.

“All the while, children on waiting lists are left waiting while the opening date of the new hospital is pushed further and further out. It is clear that the Minister is not on top of this project.”