Sir, – I am pleased that An Bord Pleanála has refused permission for the construction of a national paediatric hospital on the Mater hospital site. It was clear from the beginning that the size of the site caused serious restrictions on the design and capacity of the building. Because of its limited capacity, much of the day ward activity was planned for a totally separate location, a distance of 15 kilometres from the Mater, in Tallaght. How this flaw in the proposal continued to be ignored was simply unbelievable since an ever- increasing amount of hospital activity is now based on day ward activity. So, we have been discussing two hospital sites, not one.
The shame is that it took a decision based on central Dublin aesthetics to bring to a conclusion this essentially defective proposal. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – I cannot believe the decision of an Bord Pleanála to reject the planning application for the new children’s hospital. I have been struggling to focus on anything else since I heard about it.
My first reaction was to laugh. In what other country could this happen? After so much time spent by so many people, so many hoops jumped through, so many interested parties reassured, cajoled, fended off, and most importantly after so much of our hard-earned cash has been spent on this project, how can it come down to a few people in a room deciding if they like the design or not? How could a project of such magnitude – the largest capital project in the country – be brought so far without the involvement and help of the body who would make the final decision?
My second reaction was to cry. I have spent a lot of time in Crumlin hospital with a child who has a congenital heart problem and will require lifelong medical and surgical attention. Crumlin hospital is not fit for purpose. I have spent many nights on the floor there in Dickensian conditions. My child acquired MRSA after heart surgery and nearly died there as a result. Modern fit-for-purpose hospitals do not harbour MRSA. I have seen patients who are immuno-compromised sharing wards with orthopaedic patients. We have shared a room on a pre-operative night with another child and parent who had the flu. My child, and the children of our country, deserve a modern safe hospital.
My overwhelming reaction is one of anger. I hope parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles everywhere will lobby their politicians and tell them that enough is enough. The arguments have all been made.
We have lost three or four years already deciding where we would put the hospital. We need it now! The Minister for Health needs to show some leadership and apply some common sense here. We have waited long enough. So what if the skyline is not as we would like? So what if we stray outside the boundaries of architectural merit and don’t win the prize for the nicest cityscape? Sometimes other things are more important. Sometimes the “democratic process” is an ass. Let’s not fret too much about the city skyline but think about the more important horizon of children’s future. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – We pay hundreds of TDs and Senators; apparently not one of them can think.
A simple task of building a children’s hospital co-located with a maternity and surgical hospital can be achieved without delay. Build the new hospital on a green field site and locate the other desirable units on the same site; the only other consideration would be to ensure that easy access, parking, restaurants and hotels should be in close proximity. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – Two vast and incongruous arenas, in which adults play and watch sport, can be built right in the middle of the capital city. A modern hospital for sick children cannot be built in the centre of that same city. Is it not time that children, and those who care for them, learned their place in Irish society? – Yours, etc,
Sir, – The debacle over the national children’s hospital is the latest example of our uncanny knack of demonstrating that if there’s a hard way of doing something, we’ll find it. – Yours, etc,