Councillor blasts €2.4bn Children's Hospital 'calamity'

A Cavan councillor has described the delays and spiralling costs associated with the National Children’s Hospital as “not acceptable”, demanding answers from Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) as thousands of defects remain unresolved.

Independent Ireland’s Shane P. O’Reilly said he was “aghast” at reports that construction on the St James’s Hospital campus in Dublin remains unfinished, with further delays potentially pushing completion into 2027.

Originally estimated to cost €987 million, the project has ballooned to approximately €2.24 billion, prompting renewed scrutiny of contractor BAM and the oversight of the troubled development.

“We’re at absolute crisis point,” Cllr O’Reilly declared.

BAM missed its April 30, 2026 completion deadline. Of the hospital’s 5,728 rooms, 4,983 have reportedly reached the required contractual standards. Although nearly 200,000 defects have been addressed, 2,057 remain outstanding, according to a Department of Health briefing note supplied to the Public Accounts Committee.

Concerns include compliance and certification issues involving the hospital’s 244 bathroom pods, while Cllr O’Reilly highlighted reports that operating theatre floors had to be replaced as many as three times. He said that if this were a council project, the chief executive would have been “sacked”, with elected members themselves barred from holding public office ever again.

Describing the situation as a “calamity”, he hoped lessons would be “learned”, praising Health Minister Jennifer Carroll MacNeill as the first in a succession of ministers to take on BAM and “let them have it”.

However, he insisted the public deserved a comprehensive explanation of how the project had reached its current position.

In February 2017, Cavan councillors heard from Eilish Hardiman, then chief executive of the Children’s Hospital Group, about plans for the new facility. A similar presentation to Monaghan County Council in November 2016 had projected completion around late 2020. That deadline has long since passed.

CHI board representatives attended Cavan County Council in 2021 at elected members’ request, in what Cllr O’Reilly described as a “charm offensive”. He said they had not returned since.

When he raised the issue again in May 2026, he said BAM had just missed its 43rd deadline.

“I want to ask them why the amount has spiralled and the hospital still isn’t open yet,” he said. He referenced hopes that the hospital would open in time to coincide with Ireland’s presidency of the Council of the European Union.

“Obviously that can’t happen now,” he added.

Cllr O’Reilly questioned whether CHI representatives would attend following a fresh invitation, arguing that many involved had since “walked away”. “Does that not tell you everything?” he asked.

His motion requesting CHI representatives attend a council meeting to update members on the hospital’s construction and operation was seconded by Sinn Féin's Stiofán Conaty.