This morning.
Dr Peter Boylan resigns with immediate effect from the board of the National Maternity Hospital.
More as we get it.
Last night: Expectant
Yesterday: How Deal Leaves Doors Open For Church Control
Rollingnews
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Everything. As It Happens.
The Rats have won out.
Seems ominous
…fairplay Prof Boylan, he played his part…they won’t be able to put the lid back on this stinking can of worms…shame on Harris…
Feel sorry for him and the huge amount of work he put in. This project should have been a career highlight. A project to look back on with pride.
Commies very good at tearing things down. “if we can’t have it, nobody can”. Hospitals, education, private enterprise, personal fortune, etc., etc. Commies always lurking around ready to vandalise, rip up and tear down anything that is better than their shallow, failed ideology. They’re not so good at creating things of beauty and leading people to fruitfulness and happiness. They want equal misery for everyone – also known as “equality”.
Let “the State” go and build their own hospital. And lead their own project. That’s what it wants it seems. “The State” should have supported the project and made sure they gave it all the resources needed to make it happen. Lack of leadership from the minister is the primary cause as far as I’m concerned. Never should have got to this stage. Sad.
are you ghost of Joe McCarthy? Go back to your fupping 50s, red scare is over.
“The State” is spending €300 million to build their own hospital to then give to an order of slavers and human traffickers.
“The State” is paying for the hospital, it’s upkeep, staffing and equipment. The hospital in question is the one already owned by the nuns – St. Vincents. They don’t pay a penny towards it yet own it. Same for most hospitals and schools. That’s the opposite of communism, it’s the distribution of wealth from society to private corporations.
By all means argue for private hospitals. Or argue for public hospitals. I’d like to see you actually argue for the gifting of public hospitals to private individuals, though.
Nurse! The screens!
Give the lad a break… he just needed a day to get his legal pension / severance package papers in order.
I mean its the younguns prob now… a man of his stature needs to spend his days enjoy a ’92 Screaming Eagle Cabernet.
Sorry to hear this. The schemers have triumphed – for now.
Please.
Boylan is a drama queen shilling for the baby murder machine and those who would convince the confused and vulnerable to surgically alter their genitals (all about the €€€’s).
His philosophy is odious and out-dated.
The irony of Zuppy calling anyone a “drama queen” is duly noted.
another victory for the child abusers
Sure it’s what this country does to whistleblowers, forces them out. Wait for the Tusla file to be opened in revenge.
I agree with his stance but he was not a whistleblower.
perhaps the word “whistleblower” is wrong maybe the term should be ethical? this is what official ireland does with people who have ethical and conscience.
Go against the “official consensus” and you will be driven into the ground.
fair play to Boylan…hard on him personally I’m sure but on a more positive note he has achieved one very useful thing – a more detailed discussion about the total removal of religious entities from state business, public schools and hospitals should be owned and run by the voting public. full stop.
and I don’t think it’s game over, this is just the board who have already shown themselves to be blind and deaf being blind and deaf again, what else do you expect? they have no interest in what the public wants.
It’s politics now, Harris will have to come up with the answer. €300 mil gift to the RCC? a renewal of church control in state affairs? I don’t think so.
Stuck to his belief, despite all the evidence. How Catholic. No wonder all the BS crew hate him.. oh wait..
that’ll get ye a great laugh at the next opus de meeting
…even Prof Boylan agreed that the hospital was a wonderful plan and that Vincents was a wonderful site…what he was upset about was gifting this to a religious order…it’s good though that you highlight that evidence and catholic belief are incompatible…
Oh look, he did what I suggested he needed to do a couple of days ago but which everyone had such issues with…
As previously noted, Dr Boylan has made had a very important impact on the plans for the new NMH and the transparency around the agreement under which it will operate, but he could no longer remain a member of the board given what has taken place over the last two weeks. He made the right decision in publicizing his concerns and resigning from the board. Whether his concerns bear out or not is still to be determined, but at least the discussion can now move forward without the sideshow of the NMH internal politics on the matter (and it was a sideshow – the board of the NMH was overwhelmingly in favour of this decision, whether it is the right or wrong decision will be borne out by what agreement is signed by both SVHG and NMH/DoH, not by what Dr Boylan thinks)
Just so we are sure Owen – exactly why should Dr Boylan have resigned?
Because he was in complete disagreement with his own board (which had discussed and voted on the issue) and had criticized it publicly (including releasing private communications with other board members). He could no longer believably claim he was serving the board at that stage (and boards cannot and should not be expected to deal with all of their decisions and decision making processes in public). His laudable wish to serve ‘the public interest’ (and/or his own opinions on the matter) initially implicitly but finally explicitly set him against the NMH board.
Your continuing attempts to make whether Dr Boylan followed correct corporate protocol (or not) the main issue of concern here is interesting. You may not like his approach to communicating, but it certainly is NOT the main issue.
His own letter very clearly outlines what ARE the main issues. I see broadsheet published a legal opinion which closely aligned with his views on the legal realities of “the deal”. The Sister WILL OWN the hospital, and as the always straight talking, Bishop Doran helpfully clarified, WILL be expected to run the hospital according to catholic ethos/doctrine. The nuns appear to be running rings around the government in this situation…
Would you not agree that THAT is the most important issue here? Or is this a deflection exercise you are engaging with?
All true. There’s going to be about 40 posts from him now on this thread repeating the same old, tired, flabby waffle.
@ know man
Why bother asking me a question if you don’t want to listen to the answer? Is your unflinching belief that you are right almost religious in nature?
Still no valid reason why he should have resigned. Other than that he stood up against bullies and for his own principles.
@ know man
Of course that is a valid reason. How could the board be expected to come up with any rational decision if they were forced to deal with one member of the board who wished to criticize that board and argue his opinion on the issue in public? Should every contentious decision in the public sector be debated on Morning Ireland and Prime Time if there is a single dissent against it? This is literally the reason we appoint independent boards of experts like the NMH, to take the public outrage out of contentious issues. I am not criticising Dr Boylan from going public (far from it), but his decision to go public in the manner which he did was incompatible with remaining on that board.
@ neilo
IMO, the most important issue for *most* people is that the hospital gets built in the first place. The second most important issue is how it is run. The third most important is the legal aspects to ownership etc. I don’t think ranking the issues like this is a controversial suggestion. Its also odd that you don’t think the Boylan/NMH corporate protocol is the main issue here, but you are (understandbly) very concerned about the *corporate* protocol of the New NMH in so far as how SVGH and NMH will come to decisions in the future.
NMH agreed to this plan because it deals with the most important issue and they believe it also deals with the second issue (but there is admitted lack of clarity or vagueness here which needs to be addressed). I don’t think NMH is massively concerned about the legal/ownership structure provided issues one and two are dealt with.
The need to highlight issues two and three in the manner in which Dr Boylan did meant that he could not remain on the board (particularly as it jeopardizes issue one and makes it difficult for them to make rational and independent decisions on all three). Lauding him for his decision to go public and still requiring him to step down from the board are not mutually exclusive.
He resigned because it was the only ethical thing to do. he didn’t agree with a board decision, didn’t trust his fellow board member and put his own interests ahead of the board and the hospitals. He will have his pride and the women will get their hospital. Good result.
A myopic view on matters, in line with Owen’s attempts to imply “selfish” or “inappropriate” motivations for his behaviour.
The reality is that serving on a board bring personal responsibilities for the actions of the board. If it is your view that the incorrect/irresponsible/immoral action is being proposed by the board, all directors have a personal responsibility to either, 1) state their opposition or 2) resign giving the reasons for their wish no longer to extend their personal responsibility for the actions of the board. They are also free to change their mind when additional facts come to light laterally.
This is NOT “putting his own interests ahead of the board” as you suggest. It is the correct and proper course or actions. Especially given his concerns appear to hold significant legal and ethical water for the clinical freedom of the proposed hospital into the future (as well as the concerns regarding the gov giving the sisters a 300 million gift).
@ Neilo
“in line with Owen’s attempts to imply “selfish” or “inappropriate” motivations for his behaviour.”
I did what now? Where did I say he was selfish? Please show where or retract this suggestion. I have nothing but admiration for Dr Boylans decision to go public, and yet i feel as a board member he overstepped the mark. No more and no less.
@owen
Your suggestion is to build it first and …. then decide who owns it?!? I believe you have the cart pulling the horse. Surely one plans …. and then one acts. Who will own it and how it will be run, in my view, need to be clarified prior to any pushing ahead with the project. Those, right there, are the starting points.
I apologise if I have misrepresented your views. I say your continuing concern re “correct board member behaviour” as besides the point and finger pointing at Boylan. You are, of course, free to disagree with me.
Ha! Love it. Force the nun-luvvies into backing down with their SMS threat and then tell Rhona and Co to shove it anyway! Total Ledge!
@ neilo
“You suggestion is to build it first and …. then decide who owns it?”
No, my suggestion is to decide to build it and then reverse engineer a decision which is agreeable to all sides. Given that this issue has been ongoing for 20 years, clearly there is no ‘easy’ perfect decision which we can just proceed with, so some form of compromise on various issues needs to be made. In this case squaring the “religious organisations own the site on which we want to build and own the hospital with which we are trying to work with but we still want the NMH to be clinically independent” circle.
My basic thinking on the NMH and DoH process on this worked is as follows:
1. we need a maternity hospital. do we have the money to build this hospital? Yes.
2. do we have a basic idea for how we should do this? Yes, it needs to be built beside a general public hospital in Dublin.
3. do we have a general public hospital with available land in Dublin and that is willing to take on the basic idea? Yes, SVGH
4. we need to come up with a plan which is amenable to all of SVHG, NMH and DoH, and hopefully the public is on board as well. Can we do this? Enter Keiran Mulvey and yes.
The issue we have now is that process #4 is not to the liking for of Dr Peter Boylan and a material amount of the public. If Dr Peter Boylan and the public cannot be convinced that the deal as stands (or with minor changes) is acceptable, we are then left with:
(a) proceeding with the plan despite this unhappiness and the risks it has brought up
(b) going back to the drawing board for a new hospital plan in a different format (ie CPO) or different site altogether. This risks significant delays, which obviously a lot of people will not be happy with (including significant amounts of the public). Some people believe delays are better than existing plan.
There’s a lot of outrage here about the nuns involved, being gifted the hospital, boards being blinkered etc. Ultimately most people simply want a hospital that does what its supposed to do – deliver world class care and facilities and implement a standard of care that is consistent with our rights under the law. As long as that ends up being the case (and we need clarification and assurances that it is), the issue of legal ownership is not of significant important to most people.
I understand now that, in your view, his actions were wrong as they were contributing toward potential delays/blocking the building of the hospital.
I can see your logic also in your very clear and considered post, and believe you have captured the complexity of the issue very well (what a headache it must be giving the planners of this process!!). Thank you.
I think your most important point though is regarding what “ultimately most people simply want..” which you say is:
“…a hospital that does what its supposed to do – deliver world-class care and facilities and implement a standard of care that is consistent with our rights under the law.”
I don’t doubt that you are correct. This poses the question, will this deal achieve this? Are there not significant legal and ideological barriers here that may come back to haunt the project? (rhetorical question re problems that I realize you have already acknowledged). We all know what follows often in families when someone passes away without leaving a clear will..
While fully recognizing my own incompetence and lack of knowledge in the area, the main cause of the complexity of this “have the money for much-needed hospital but can’t build it” situation is encapsulated in your point re needing to site it alongside a “general public hospital with available land in Dublin and that is willing to take on the basic idea? Yes, SVGH”. The problem being that SVHG hospital is a public funded but private owned “voluntary” hospital. The private ethos is, therefore, the problem, especially so given this is a maternity hospital.
A complete solution to our privately owned “public healthcare” is the actual problem… but I guess that is another day’s work.
My own preference, have both new hospitals sited in Blanchardstown and removing them from the political mess that has held them up for 20 years. I assume, though, that I am ignorant of some very important information that makes this choice a runner.
“A complete solution to our privately owned “public healthcare” is the actual problem… but I guess that is another day’s work.”
Another decade perhaps. But you have hit the nail on the head – it is incredibly difficult if not impossible to build the New NMH to the specification (location, design, services) required without it interacting at some level with a religiously-affiliated institution under the current system of publicly provided healthcare (note there has been practically zero reasonable alternatives offered other than “CPO” or “RTE”). I’m at a loss as to why people can’t understand this basic core issue.
We don’t do hard decisions well in Ireland and try to find far-from-perfect-but-just-about-the-minimum-accepted solutions to fit with our little country’s odd way of looking at things. Many other countries try to use compromises as well, but seem to have better track records of actual high level delivery. That we often deliver 5-out-of-10 (at best) levels of ‘solution’ is why so many people are understandably against the latest compromise, but maybe this one is capable of delivering 7 or 8 or 9?
I know, similarly, 93% of all schools in this country share the same “private ownership but use public funded” model. The Gov has indicated it wishes to undertake a similar process of “divestment” of ownership from the congregations in the healthcare domain that it has commenced in education. Maybe this is the long-term solution?
That said, the divestment of ownership of schools process is not exactly going swimmingly, is it…..
Either way, this will take years and will long over-run the building of both the children’s and maternity hospitals. Boylan’s concerns, in my view, still stand, however, and possibly an increased level of care in this process may be no harm.
Difficult to fundamentally screw up building and operating a new school. Hospitals more complex, but they’re both on the same basic trajectory, albeit still a long way to go.
Ah gosh, yes. The state appears to make very hard work of merely planning both of these hospitals as it stands, let alone actually building one of em.
My point was that the congregations are not too happy to be giving them up it appears (which is perhaps understandable in many ways). Still, if they are not paying the running costs anymore they should not be enabled to maintain ownership control (IMHO oF course)
…valiant attempt here to say the issue is over, move on…afraid not…this is only beginning from what I can see…no way should the evil magdalene sisters have any sway in a new maternity hospital…
Catholics are bad. Mmmkay?
Thanks Owen C for your measured and rational posts. If you think it’s bad here, try posting them on Rabble and see how they react.