Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly has said he will meet with “all the stakeholders” involved in the National Maternity Hospital shortly, but as far as he was concerned there were “two separate issues” relating to the matter – clinical independence and ownership of the site.
Speaking on RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland, the Minister said he feels full clinical and operational independence was the “priority” issue and he wanted to ensure that such governance was “bulletproof” and “waterproof”.
Mr Donnelly said he would only bring a recommendation forward if he had the best legal advice on the issue of full clinical independence.
“In operational terms it doesn’t matter who owns the land,” he said.
However, the Minister said it was important who owned the land and it was his own preference that the State and the people of Ireland would own the land on which the new maternity hospital was located. The women of Ireland were sick of being told what was in their best interests when it came to their reproductive rights, he added.
Mr Donnelly said he was going to meet with all the stakeholders, adding it had not been helpful that the St Vincent’s Healthcare Group (SVHG) had set out conditions in a press release.
“My position is that the people of Ireland want to own the land that their own maternity hospital is on,” he said.
It also was not helpful that “red lines” regarding a compulsory purchase order (CPO) had been put down, the Minister added.
There was no option that would give any stakeholder everything they wanted, Mr Donnelly said, adding he did not want to go the CPO route as it could take years and it would not be good for a “decades long” collaboration to start in court.
“It’s important that we listen and see where we go from there,” Mr Donnelly said.
Earlier this week, SVHG said it must retain ownership of the site to ensure the delivery of integrated patient care.
The group said there will be “no religious or Vatican influence” on the hospital, stating the hospital will be "clinically independent".
