Work on site of children’s hospital starts early next year

Construction work on the long-delayed new national children’s hospital will finally start early next year — provided the project overcomes an expected An Bord Pleanála grilling this autumn.

Officials for the facility, which will cater for hundreds of thousands of seriously ill children across the country, revealed the timeline yesterday.

Speaking during an update briefing at the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland, senior members of the new hospital’s board said the exact design of the St James’s Hospital site is still being developed.