It’s child’s play Simon — change hospital location

The new Minister for Health, Simon Harris, has called for vested interests in the health system to put aside their egos so that problems can be tackled.

Well let’s see if he is intellectually mature enough at the ripe old age of 29, having spent his entire adult life in a political bubble, to put aside his own ego and once and for all move the new Children’s Hospital to a brown field site on the outskirts of Dublin where the hospital will have sufficient room for future expansion and to meet the needs of the patients and their families, not the vested interests of the medical professions fighting a turf war.

You don’t need to be a genius to see Irish officialdom has proven itself utterly incapable of making proper infrastructure decisions for the long term.

It is not unreasonable to think, that, the more certain vested interests dig in their heels on the current proposed location, the more you know they are wrong.

Their resistance is precisely because to change their mind would mean admitting they were wrong and Irish officialdom, especially the political kind, don’t ever like to do that.

Their ego won’t let them.

So let’s see if Mr Harris, with all the vigour and openness of youth, is capable of rising above their resistance to show he can be one of the better Ministers for Health, not afraid to face down big egos – his own included.

Desmond FitzGerald

Canary Wharf

London

England