Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin accused Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe and Minister for Health Simon Harris of being “asleep at the wheel” over the spiralling of costs for the national children’s hospital.
But replying for the Government the Tánaiste said there had already been some accountability because the chairman of the hospital board had stepped aside. The Tánaiste noted that the two Ministers had stated that they would report back to Cabinet in a month about the necessary decisions on tightening spending.He also hit out at Mr Martin’s claim that the same mistakes were being repeated in other contracts including the proposals for the national broadband plan.
Ms McDonald asked who was accountable for the “administrative incompetence, professional incompetence and political incompetence”.There was “unfortunately a process that up until late last year was still proposing that a national children’s hospital of this scale could be built for far, far less than it’s going to cost”.