The Dáil’s public spending watchdog wants the board overseeing the development of the national children’s hospital (NCH) and the organisation that will run the facility to appear before them this week.
This Thursday’s meeting of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is set to be the last before the general election is called.
There has been speculation that Taoiseach Simon Harris will officially fire the starting gun on the general election by asking President Michael D Higgins to dissolve the Dáil on Thursday or Friday. The PAC is scheduled to meet at 9.30am on Thursday morning.
PAC chairwoman Mairéad Farrell said the possibility of the election being called while the PAC is in session is “something we’ll have to prepare for”.
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The PAC is seeking to examine the accounts of both the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB) and Children’s Health Ireland (CHI).
The committee has been closely examining the €2.2 billion NCH project which has been beset by delays and spiralling costs.
Ms Farrell has written to both the NPHDB and CHI seeking their appearance before the committee this Thursday, November 7th.
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The letters come after correspondence from NPHDB and CHI separately indicated they would not be available to appear on that date.
The NPHDB said it would be unable to attend “due to the unavailability of a key witness” and that it could appear on both November 21st and 28th.
It has since confirmed that the key witness who is unavailable is chief officer David Gunning.
Separately, Fiona Murphy, the interim chief executive of CHI – which will run the children’s hospital after construction has been completed – also requested that she attend at a later date.
On Monday, the NPHDB and CHI further responded to the committee, separately outlining how Mr Gunning and Ms Murphy were unavailable this week.
A NPHDB statement said it told the PAC on October 16th that it was unable to attend on November 7th but confirmed availability for November 21st and 28th.
It said since Mr Gunning’s appointment as chief officer in September 2019, “he, together with other senior colleagues, have attended the PAC on at least seven occasions”.
This happened most recently on May 30th when the PAC examined its 2022 financial statements and an “extensive written update” was provided to the committee in July.
The NPHDB said representatives appeared at the Committee on Health in September and October to provide updates on the NCH project to the Oireachtas members.
A CHI statement said it requested a change of date from November 7th on October 25th “due to the unavailability of its interim chief executive”.
Ms Farrell described the situation as “very disappointing”.
The invitation was discussed at a meeting of the PAC last week and letters from Ms Farrell to both the NPHDB and CHI reiterated the committee’s expectation that they would appear at the committee this Thursday.
She told The Irish Times: “We have been very clear that we expect both the board and Children’s Health Ireland to come before PAC.
“It’s extremely important for us to be able to analyse their financial statements specifically because of course we’re talking about over €2 billion of taxpayers’ money.”
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