Top officials at the three children's hospitals in Dublin have been told by the Department of Health and the Health Service Executive (HSE) that they would be better off taking part in the process of developing a new national paediatric centre rather than remaining outside. Martin Wallreports.
The Irish Timesunderstands that at a meeting on Tuesday with the chief executives of the National Children's Hospital at Tallaght, Our Lady's Hospital in Crumlin and Temple Street hospital, senior officials of the Department of Health and the HSE reiterated that the Government had decided the new national centre would be developed on a site at the Mater hospital.
Government sources said the hospitals were told that it would be in their interest to co-operate with the process at this stage.
The Government decided last summer that a new national hospital for children should be developed at the Mater complex on the northside of Dublin.
The proposed new centre would replace facilities for children at Crumlin, Tallaght and Temple Street.
However the Government decision has been criticised strongly by management and staff at Our Lady's hospital in Crumlin and by Tallaght.
Informed sources said that the chief executives of the three hospitals were given an update on planning work for the new development, which is being carried out by a transition group comprising both Department of Health and HSE personnel.
Outside consultants are to be appointed to draw up a brief on facilities to be included in the new children's hospital.
The consultants will also look at the new urgent-care centres for children that are to be developed at two or three strategic locations around Dublin.
The consultants' report, which is expected after Easter, will be used as a basis for the full design brief for the new hospital which will be drawn up subsequently.
Last weekend some 500 nurses at Crumlin expressed concern at the plan to site the new national children's hospital on the campus of the Mater hospital.
The intervention of the nurses in the row over the selection of the Mater as the site for the new hospital has been viewed by some observers as an indication that large numbers of staff could resist any attempt to move them to the new hospital.
The nurses said that they believed the Mater hospital "is located in a highly inaccessible part of the city centre".
They maintained that many parents currently attending Crumlin with sick children "have complained to us that they would find it extremely difficult getting to the Mater site and most would prefer if they could avoid driving into the city centre".
Furthermore, they say that their views about the suitability of the Mater site have not been sought.
Last month a report from the board of Crumlin hospital called for a review of the Mater site decision.
The board urged the HSE and the Department of Health to reconsider the possibility of building the hospital on a greenfield site where there would also be room to accommodate a maternity hospital and an adult hospital.
Earlier this month the Church of Ireland Archbishop of Dublin, Dr John Neill, complained that plans by the Government and the HSE to locate a new national children's hospital at the Mater site in Dublin were being "steam-rolled ahead" without proper consideration.
He described the plans as ill-conceived and said they arose from a flawed process which was not good for children.
There have also been large protest marches in Tallaght in recent months against the plans to transfer facilities for children to the new centre at the Mater hospital.