Belfast maternity hospital delay a ‘scandal’

The announcement that the opening of Belfast’s new maternity hospital could be delayed is “nothing short of a scandal”, according to a member of Stormont’s health committee.

DUP assembly member Diane Dodds said that it was “10 years too late and double the cost”.

On Monday Northern Ireland’s Health Minister Mike Nesbitt announced that the opening of hospital could be delayed by another 28 months, after ongoing building work problems which include dangerous bacteria found in the water system.

The Belfast Trust has said while the delays were frustrating it was vital that water safety issues were addressed before vulnerable patients were cared for.

Nesbitt told the assembly he could not “soften the news” and has asked for an external expert to review if the decision taken is the best one and if parts of the hospital, at the Royal Victoria Hospital site, could be opened in the meantime.

Speaking to BBC Radio Ulster’s Good Morning Ulster programme, Dodds said that it had been 15 months since the building had been handed over to the Belfast Trust and “most worryingly of all, the health minister said that none of the options might actually solve the problem”.

She said that the health minister should “get a grip” of the situation.

Dodds added that the delay had come at a time when there other problems at the hospital and asked the Health Committee would “this scandal of wasting public money” be within the the remit for “special measures”, she said she was told no.

“I think clearly that the health minister should consider this a matter for special measures.”

She said that people “deserve much better” and patient safety should be paramount.

“It is outrageous that we don’t know whether it will be 28 months or longer.

“The responsibility for the failure in relation to this lies squarely with the Belfast Trust,” she said.

Also speaking on the programme, Patricia McKeown from the union UNISON said that she was “cynical by the frustrations of politicians” when it comes to the delay.

She added that the collapse of devolution for long periods since proposed maternity services should be located in a new hospital on the Royal Hospital site in 1999 had not helped.

During last Thursday’s health committee, it emerged that the health trust faced three options to try and fix the water system.

These included:

• Ongoing testing of individual water taps across the building
• Installing a “discreet checking system” for high-risk areas including the neonatal unit
• Pulling out the entire water system, which was described by management as “excessive”

The new maternity hospital, which is based in the grounds of the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast, is already 10 years behind schedule and has cost £97m so far.

At present management has chosen the second option which they said was the “safest” way to proceed as vulnerable babies would be protected.

The trust took possession of the five-storey building in March 2024 and began a “clinical commissioning phase” – a process of ensuring a safe transition of service to the new site.

Just a few months later in July, the trust said that during testing of water outlets, high levels of Pseudomonas aeruginosa were discovered in the water system.

Pseudomonas infection killed three babies at Belfast’s Royal Jubilee Hospital in 2012.

The infection does not usually affect healthy people but infants and people with weakened immune systems are vulnerable.

A spokesperson for the Belfast Trust said the significant delays were “deeply” frustrating for everyone involved in the project, but it was vital the water safety issues were addressed before vulnerable patients were cared for.

They added that their proposed solution to the problem was arrived at after a review of all “available information regarding the water systems within the new Maternity Hospital”.

“The work included in the preferred option will take, in total, 24 months and then four months to move staff, patients, and services into the new hospital.”