'Unusually high' protection for State in governance of new National Maternity Hospital, says Attorney General

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has said that the Government has received legal advice that there is no guarantee that a compulsory purchase order of the site would succeed. Picture: Brian Lawless

The State will have “an unusually high” level of protection in the governance arrangements in the new National Maternity Hospital, the Government’s lawyer has concluded.

In what was described as a key intervention at Cabinet, the Attorney General Paul Gallagher reportedly told ministers that the 300-year lease and the secular nature of the board means the State has a level of comfort not normally seen.

Several ministerial sources have confirmed to the Irish Examiner that while no written memorandum was circulated in advance or at the Cabinet, Mr Gallagher’s verdict offered a “sufficient degree of comfort”.

Attorney General Paul Gallagher. Picture: Damien Storan.

Even though the decision was taken to pause the formal ratification by Cabinet for two weeks, Mr Gallagher’s assessment was seen as a clear sign that the deal will proceed.

The controversial arrangement dominated proceedings in the Dáil on Thursday, with Opposition TDs demanding to know why the State does not simply buy the land from the hospital.

In response to such questions, St Vincent’s Hospital Group (SVHG) told the Irish Examiner that a land sale was “never considered a viable option” in the context of being able to manage multiple, integrated healthcare facilities on a single campus.

The hospital said the lands have been owned by the SVHG — a legal entity in its own right — for the past 20 years and not the Religious Sisters of Charity, as has been claimed by some in recent days.

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has said that the Government has received legal advice that there is no guarantee that a compulsory purchase order (CPO) of the land earmarked for the new National Maternity Hospital site would be successful.

Mr Donnelly said he had received "clear" advice from the Attorney General that there was "absolutely no guarantee that a CPO would succeed".

We would need to show that we need to own the land, I would imagine that St Vincent's, or indeed the courts would say: 'Well, you do own the land for the next 300 years'.

"So there is no guarantee that it would succeed."

Mr Donnelly also said that the plan to co-locate the National Maternity Hospital (NMH) at a site at St Vincent's in Dublin is meant to be "a partnership", and that this partnership may be complicated or abandoned due to legal proceedings required to compulsory purchase the land.