Group behind controversial children's museum pledges to raise €25m for €70m project

A visualisation of the proposed but as yet unrealised national children’s science centre. Picture: 3ddesignbureau.com

The group behind a long-standing push to build a State-owned children’s science museum in Dublin says it plans to raise €25m to contribute to the construction of the controversial €70m-budgeted project.

Irish Children’s Museum Limited chief executive Barbara Galavan will tell the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Thursday that the project in question is a “critically important” one for the country.

She will tell the committee that under the group’s plans, the new museum will include three floors of interactive exhibits, a 122-seat planetarium,  a theatre, and “fully equipped science laboratory spaces”.

The Office of Public Works, which will also be at the PAC, first agreed to construct the museum in 2003 and remains legally obligated to do so at the site of the National Concert Hall in collaboration with ICML, despite the fact a privately owned children’s museum — Explorium in south Dublin — has existed in the capital since 2019.

Last September, the Comptroller and Auditor General, Séamus McCarthy, revealed the OPW had had no authority to approve the construction of the museum in 2003 but proceeded regardless, exposing the State to “unnecessary risk”.

'Omnishambles'

At the time, the proposed building on Earlsfort Terrace in Dublin was budgeted at €14.3m, a figure that rose to €26m in 2013 before reaching its current level of €70.4m, not including the value of the site.

Members of the PAC had described the ICML project as an “omnishambles” and an “unmitigated disaster” in the aftermath of the C&AG report, given no sponsor can be found to build it yet the OPW remains legally obliged to do so.

Ms Galavan is expected to tell the PAC that the “delays which have regrettably beset the project” over the past 25 years have left Ireland as “the only OECD country without a national science centre for children”.

“ICML has committed to raising €25 million for the fit out of the science centre, which will be gifted to the State for the benefit of children,” she will say.

“This has been made possible due to the ongoing strong philanthropic support for the project from leaders and employers in technology and science. They see the need, and are willing to back it financially.” 

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The PAC has repeatedly been told in recent times that regardless of the OPW’s obligation to build the museum — which has been reaffirmed via two separate arbitration processes — no departmental sponsor can be found to fund the project.

The privately owned Explorium science centre was opened in the southside suburb of Sandyford in 2019 and remains operational.

It is believed that entity would not be hostile towards discussions aimed at bringing it into State ownership, in collaboration with ICML if possible, and that engagement has occurred between both sides in recent times.