Five million euro spent on legal fees over children’s hospital disputes

The development board of the new children’s hospital has spent more than five million euro on legal fees over the last 12 years.

The Public Accounts Committee heard on Thursday that the serially delayed 2.2 billion-euro project does not currently have a substantial completion date.

David Gunning, chief executive of the New Children’s Hospital Development Board, said its cumulative bill for general legal fees was 5.3 million euro between 2014 and February 2026.

He said this came from settling, adjudicating and defending one billion euro in claims over disputes with lead contractor BAM.

He said “there’s quite a number of claims” that have yet to go through “of a similar quantum”, with additional matters before the High Court.

However, he said – notwithstanding litigation – the board was confident it would deliver the project for under its 1.88 billion euro share of the budget – with the remaining 361 million euro falling on Children’s Health Ireland (CHI).

CHI transformation director Julia Lewis said that figure was based on a completion date in 2025 – and said it could rise higher depending on when it receives the building.

Speaking to the committee on what was previously supposed to be one of the several revised substantial completion dates, Mr Gunning said he was not in a position to provide a new substantial completion date as BAM had not yet provided a programme update to the employer’s representative.

However, on substantial completion, he said: “We are close – it’s months we’re talking about.”

Mr Gunning said it was the board’s view that BAM was not resourcing the project adequately.

“BAM has missed its substantial completion dates. This is primarily due to its failure to deploy sufficient skilled labour and competent management resources to properly supervise the site and maintain effective quality assurance processes.

BAM consistently states that it is adequately resourcing the project and that the development programme has evolved in response to “instructed design changes” and “additional scope” during the project, with each updated completion date reflecting those changes rather than “any failure of performance”.

However, the development board’s project director Phelim Devine said design is not delaying completion as he blamed “rework and closing out defects”.

He told the committee there had not been any design change on the project in 2026 that had impacted physical work on site, adding that there had been “no material change to design and functionality” to the building since 2019.

“If you go back nine months, it’s 58 issues in 58 rooms. If you go back 18 months, it’s, I think, 200 issues in about 200 rooms.”

“And I’m going to give you an idea what they are, they’re very simple issues. It’s moving a socket in a room, or it’s actually adding an emergency light.”

He acknowledged there had been 23,500 reissues of drawings – with 6,000 core drawings associated with the project going through revisions.

After the completion of construction, the hospital will also require an estimated seven-month commissioning period before it is ready for use.