The Health Service Executive (HSE) has given the first clear indication it is considering the establishment of a new maternity service on the site of the planned national children's hospital.
The HSE, The Irish Times has learned, has also written for the first time yesterday to the consortium headed by developer Noel Smyth and to the private sector Beacon Medical Group, seeking a meeting on their plans for the children's hospital.
The HSE has previously noted that the Smyth proposal was not located with an adult teaching academic hospital. The inter-agency group, headed by the HSE, has already met the public hospitals which have submitted proposals but has had no contact with the private sector interests.
As part of the group's, examination of possible locations for the hospital, it has written to applicants in recent days seeking information as to whether their sites had capacity to accommodate a new maternity centre in addition to the paediatric facility.
It is unclear as to whether the HSE is envisaging the provision of an additional maternity service in Dublin or whether it is looking for a site to facilitate the amalgamation of the existing maternity units. At present, there are three public maternity centres in Dublin - the Rotunda, the Coombe Women's Hospital, and the National Maternity Hospital at Holles Street.
In Cork, the HSE is planning the amalgamation of all maternity services, public and private, on a site at Cork University Hospital.
Six public hospitals and two private sector groups have expressed an interest in developing the planned new 380-bed children's facility, which could cost up to €500 million.
The various applicants have been given until early next week to reply to the letter from the HSE regarding the proposed maternity service. The Irish Times understands the Beacon Group has proposed building a new children's facility near its private hospital in Sandyford in south Dublin.
Last week, it emerged that Mr Smyth's consortium had proposed developing a new children's hospital at cost price on a site it owns at Newlands Cross, near the M50. Other facilities, including a maternity hospital, residential accommodation and a hotel, would be built at standard prices, it said. Mr Smyth said that, if the proposal for Newlands Cross was not acceptable, his group would build the children's facility at cost price in any other location designated.
The inter-agency taskforce, which includes representatives of the HSE, the Department of Health and the Office of Public Works, is expected to finalise its recommendation on a location for the new children's hospital by the end of next week, or early in the week after Easter.
This recommendation is likely to go before a meeting of the HSE board and will be submitted to Minister for Health Mary Harney for a final decision.
A HSE spokesman said last night the inter-agency group had sought final clarification from those who had expressed an interest in the children's hospital project on a number of issues.
