Tag Archives: National Maternity Hospital

From top: Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly; The Dermatology Department of St. Vincent’s University Hospital – this building currently occupies the site of the proposed National Maternity Hospital (NMH)

This morning.

Government plans to approve the relocation of the National Maternity Hospital have been put on hold after Ministers expressed unhappiness at the process and sought further time to consider it.

Via RTE News:

The Minister for Health has said he can “100% guarantee” that every service provided for by law, including termination of pregnancy, tubal ligation, assisted reproduction and gender affirming surgery, will be provided for at the new National Maternity Hospital.

The issue will come before ministers again in two weeks’ time.

Mr Donnelly said the plans were not approved yesterday because it was felt that the many questions raised, which reflected the “very genuine concerns” people have around the country, had to be addressed.

Minister insists every service provided by law available at NMH (RTE)

Meanwhile…

…via Irish Times:

Fine Gael Ministers, including Minister for Social Protection Heather Humphreys, Minister for Justice Helen McEntee and Minister of State for Transport Hildegarde Naughton, as well as Green Party Minister Catherine Martin, sought assurances from Mr Donnelly that all legal healthcare services would be available at the hospital.

National Maternity Hospital relocation plan on hold as Ministers express doubts (Irish Times)

Meanwhile…

Last night.

Meanwhile…

This morning.

RollingNews

Above from left: Green Party Dublin City Council Councillor Hazel Chu; Sinn Fein Cllr Larry O’Toole; Social Democrats Cllr Catherine Stocker; and Green Party Cllr Janet Horner

This afternoon.

Leinster House, Kildare Street, Dublin 2.

The signatories of a letter calling on Health Minister Stephen Donnelly to reconsider plans to locate the new National Maternity Hospital at St Vincent’s Hospital, Elm Park, Dublin 4 gather outside Leinster House. The Sisters of Charity intend to hand over their interest in the land, and in the running the hospital, to a company called St. Vincent’s Holdings, which is obliged to “uphold the values and visions of [Mother of the Religious Sisters of Charity] Mother Mary Aikenhead (who founded St Vincent’s Hospital).”

Previously: 73% in favour of buying land for new National Maternity Hospital, poll

RollingNews

Last night.

Kildare Street, Dublin 2.

TDs, including Sinn Féin President Mary Lou McDonald (above left), joined activists from The Campaign Against Church Ownership of Women’s Healthcare at a candle Light vigil outside Leinster House to remember the death of Savita Halappanavar – 9 years ago yesterday – and to ‘highlight the imperative’ for the new National Maternity Hospital to be ‘public and secular’.

RollingNews

From top; Dermatology Department of St. Vincent’s University Hospital occupying the proposed site of the new National Maternity Hospital (NMH); David Cullinane and Stephen Donnelly

This morning.

Oireachtas Committee on Health.

Minister for Health Stephen  Donnelly said €51 million has already been spent on the proposed site of the new National Maternity Hospital.

Sinn Féin TD David Cullinane asked:

“So, we spent €51 million on a hospital that so far there hasn’t been agreement [on] in relation to the lease and in relation to the actual governance structure?”

Minister Donnelly said that these works [including the construction of a replacement pharmacy and an extension to the multi-storey car park at St Vincent’s] were “enabling works” and there was “board agreement that this would be the location”.

Anyone?

€51m spent on new National Maternity Hospital so far (RTÉ)

Yesterday: Our Children Will Pay For It

RollingNews

From top: a National Maternity Hospital ownership protest last Saturday outside Leinster House; Dr Peter Boylan, former Master of the National Maternity Hospital

This morning.

Via Irish Times Letters:

I read with attention the letter signed by 42 of the current consultant staff at the National Maternity Hospital. One sentence that jumped out was that “all care within Irish law is currently being provided at Holles Street and will be provided at the new hospital”.

No one doubts the first part of the sentence, but it is the uncertainty about the second part which is a key factor in the current controversy.

My colleagues’ fears about misinformation are well-founded.

We are being asked to believe that the Religious Sisters of Charity’s successor company, St Vincent’s Holdings, is secular, while the Letter of Grant from the Vatican directed the Sisters explicitly to observe specified canon laws in setting up the company, and the constitution of that company retains the core values of the order. The directors are “obliged to hold the values and vision” of the order’s founder including that “the sanctity of life belongs to all persons from conception to their natural end”.

The extraordinary claims last week that abortions under the terms of the 2018 Act are performed at St Vincent’s Hospital must be verified. Under the terms of the Act, all abortions must be notified to the Minister for Health within 28 days, with information that includes the grounds for each abortion.

The national report for 2020 is due to be published by June 30th. The Minister must now confirm exactly how many abortions took place at St Vincent’s between January 1st, 2019 and May 31st, 2021 and under which grounds.

I do not believe that Archbishops Eamon Martin and Dermot Farrell can continue to remain silent about such serious claims, given the strict prohibition on abortion in every Catholic hospital around the world, except apparently St Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin 4.

The NMH must shoulder a large part of the responsibility for the delays to the project.

First, the decision by the board to cede ownership of the hospital to the Sisters of Charity in 2016 caused public and political furore when it emerged in 2017, and led to the Sisters announcing their intention to transfer their shareholding in St Vincent’s Healthcare Group.

Second, after repeated denials by the NMH that Vatican permission was required, it took until March 2020 before permission was in fact conditionally granted.

Third is the failure by the board of the NMH to submit an acceptable business case to Government. The first iteration appears to have been rejected by the Department of Public Reform and Expenditure in December 2020. My understanding is that a revised business case has yet to be submitted.

Following last week’s Social Democrats’ motion on the new hospital, which the Government parties did not oppose, there is now all-party political consensus that the new hospital will be fully State owned and built on State land.

A rally outside Leinster House last Saturday saw a broad range of civil society organisations oppose the current plan and call for full State ownership, including the National Women’s Council of Ireland.

The issue will at some point come before Cabinet, though much work remains to be done, not least the “double-checking” of the legal advice the Government has received to date, and the resubmission of Holles Street’s business case.

Tánaiste Leo Varadkar has said that ownership of the land is a red line for the Government and that there is “a risk” the project will not go ahead at Elm Park if the State does not own the land. In a series of thoughtful interventions Taoiseach Micheál Martin has noted that “he still has concerns about governance arrangements and that there could be no semblance or even perception of religious influence”.

Beyond the row about one hospital, the Taoiseach noted in the Dáil last week that “when the State is investing, the State should own”. Finally, I am at a loss to understand why my colleagues are resistant to State ownership. Surely that would give them the hospital they need and cast iron guarantees of medical and operational independence.

Dr Peter Boylan,

Dublin 6.

Irish Times Letters.

Yesterday: Hospital Pass

RollingNews

Saturday.

Kildate Street and Merrion Street, Dublin 2.

Protestors campaigning against the Catholic Church owning the new National Maternity Hospital outside Leinster House and government buildings after It emerged that the religious order that runs SVHG, the Sisters of Charity, would retain ownership of the hospital.

Meanwhile, this morning…

…Via Irish Times letters:

We, the consultants of the National Maternity Hospital, are concerned by the potential for misinformation and misunderstanding to delay a vital project to create a world-class maternity hospital for the women and babies of Ireland.

The misinformation that services at the new maternity hospital will be curtailed by any religious ethos is particularly troubling given its inaccuracy.

We want to reassure women and their families that all obstetric, neonatal and gynaecological care within Irish law is currently being provided at Holles Street, and will be provided in the new hospital. This will include terminations, tubal ligation, transgender and assisted reproduction services.

We as clinicians could not countenance any restriction on our practice based on religion.

A cast-iron guarantee in this regard is included in the proposed operating licence to be granted by the Department of Health for the new hospital, and we would not allow the project to proceed without this in place.

Any further delay in approving this project damages the interests of the mothers and babies who are grossly ill-served by the existing cramped NMH campus which is not fit for purpose, with buildings that are almost 90 years old.

It would be a tragedy if the current impasse further delays a colocation project that was first raised back in 1998.

We acknowledge the difficult journey and huge work to date by all stakeholders and we urge that time and space be given to continue their work to find a resolution to the current impasse.

Irish Times Letters

RollingNews

This afternoon.

The Dáil at the Convention Centre.

Earlier…

From top: Statement from St. Vincent’s University Hospital (SVHG)Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly; the Dermatology Department of St. Vincent’s University Hospital – this building currently occupies the site of the new National Maternity Hospital (NMH). St Vincent’s Hospital Group has rejected calls for the government to purchase the site in order to ensure the NMH is fully publicly owned.

This morning.

Via Irish Examiner:

The Health Minister Stephen Donnelly confirmed on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland. that despite a statement last night in which the St Vincent’s Hospital Group (SVHG) said it would not sell the land to the state, a meeting between the state and the religious order has been agreed.

He said:

“The people of Ireland fund St Vincent’s. I think the given that the people of Ireland are owed more respect than to be told by press release by St Vincent’s what is and is not going to happen,”

“The government’s position is the people of Ireland, or the women of Ireland, wants to own the land that their own maternity hospital is built on.

I would very much like to see that facilitated and I think it would be in everyone’s interest if that was.

“I think they should be cognisant and have a bit more respect for the people of Ireland who fund their hospital, I don’t think that’s the way to do business. These conversations need to be held and they need to be held respectfully,”

‘The people of Ireland are owed more respect than to be told by press release’ (Irish Examiner)

Government Needs to Play Hardball With Nuns (Newstalk)

RollingNews

This afternoon.

Kildare Street, Dublin 2.

Lord Mayor of Dublin Hazel Chu and Solidarity–People Before Profit TD Brid Smith with protestors from the Repeal the 8th movement outside Leinster House, as they call on Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly to ensure that the National Maternity Hospital will be fully secular, and will be under no Church control.

Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews

Update:

Hmm.

From top:  St Vincent’s Hospital; Dr Peter Boylan (left) Archbishop Eamon Martin

This morning.

Dr Peter Boylan writes:

[Irish Times Religious Affairs correspondent] Patsy McGarry reports that an unnamed canon lawyer believes that “there is nothing in the letter of grant” from Rome which could be seen as “a stipulation that church canon law, doctrine or teaching must be observed by St Vincent’s Holdings, or the proposed NMH”.

This opinion is baffling.

I too have seen the letter of grant of March 16th, signed by senior Vatican official Sr Carmen Ros Nortes. She states that the Vatican grants the transfer request by the Sisters of Charity “in conformity with the petition” and that, “The provisions relating to the validity and lawfulness of alienations, found in Canons 638-639 and Canons 1292-1294 of the Code of Canon Law and in Proper Law, are to be observed.”

This last sentence is emphasised in bold type in the communication.

Thus, everything the Sisters of Charity now do in respect of transferring their 100 per cent shareholding in St Vincent’s Healthcare Group to St Vincent’s Holdings CLG must observe canon law, specifically the canons cited and must be in conformity with the reasons they gave the Vatican for wanting to undertake the transfer.

In this respect, Canon 1293 is particularly relevant. Canon 1293.1.1. requires that the Sisters of Charity must have “a just cause, such as urgent necessity, evident advantage, piety, charity, or some other grave pastoral reason” to make the transfer.

Canon 1293.2. requires that “other precautions prescribed by legitimate authority are also to be observed to avoid harm to the Church”.

As a result of the Vatican stipulations, the problem now facing the Sisters of Charity is how to effect a transfer that brings 186 years of Catholic healthcare ministry to an end, the result of which will facilitate a hospital which will perform abortions and other procedures absolutely forbidden by Catholic teaching?

Where is the “just cause” and what is the potential for such approval to cause “harm to the church” in the eyes of the faithful?

No wonder many Irish Catholics are alarmed and confused.

In comments published in the Sunday Times over the weekend, Archbishop Eamon Martin stated that “the carrying out of abortions or morally illicit medical procedures at the NMH would be repugnant” to Catholic teaching and “regardless of the eventual outcome of the proposed transfer, the church will remain clear in its public statements that there is no place in a maternity hospital for abortion”.

How does Archbishop Martin reconcile Catholic teaching on abortion with his support for the Sisters’ request to the Vatican which will clear the way for St Vincent’s Holdings CLG to own a hospital in which abortion, IVF, elective sterilisation and other procedures will constitute part of the daily routine?

What does the Primate of All Ireland consider to be the “just cause” for this transfer? Is he concerned about harm to the church?

The constitution of St Vincent’s Holdings CLG, which will own the new NMH, will surely be subject to the provisions of the canon laws outlined in the letter of grant.

This is not a theoretical discussion. The taxpayers of Ireland who will fund the new NMH, and the women of Ireland who will attend it, deserve clarity.

None of the information currently in the public domain allays well-founded fears about the potential for Catholic ethos to influence clinical practice in the new NMH.

And all this before full consideration as to why even the Irish Government would hand ownership of a €500 million maternity hospital of key national importance to a private charity. – Yours, etc,

Dr Peter Boylan
Life Governor and former Master, National Maternity Hospital,
Dublin 6.

National Maternity Hospital and canon law (Irish Times Letters)

Last week: ‘The Makings Of A Very Irish Scandal’

Rollingnews

From top: Michael Kelly (left), editor of The Irish Catholic, and Minister for Health Simon Harris; The proposed new National Maternity Hospital; a tweet apparently from the account of Minister Harris this morning which has since been deleted; Response from Social Democrats co-leader Róisín Shortall

This morning.

Further to Social Democrats co-leader Róisín Shortall’s call on the Government to ‘come clean’ on the position between the Vatican and the State on the new National Maternity hospital, and to halt further spending until ownership is resolved…

An exclusive report in The Irish Catholic states that the Vatican is being lobbied to block the Religious Sisters of Charity from transferring land to the State to facilitate the building of the new National Maternity Hospital.

Michael Kelly reports that Rome-based theologian Fr Kevin O’Reilly has said that the Holy See has an obligation to block the plans.

Mr Kelly reports:

[Fr Kelly said:] “Thanks to the 36th Amendment of the Constitution, Ireland – to its great shame – now boasts an extremely liberal abortion regime.

“It is in this context that the Religious Sisters of Charity issued their recent statement concerning the ‘imminent’ legal transfer of their shares in St Vincent’s Healthcare Group”.

However, Fr O’Reilly said that “in the wake of any future abortions, no one involved in executing the transfer to date can reasonably turn around and say that this eventuality was unforeseen.

“It is bewildering that those who have facilitated the process to date clearly do not possess any degree of moral foresight.

“One can only hope that the competent officials in the Vatican will act in accord with the Church’s constant teaching and the dictates of right reason by forbidding this unconscionable act,” he said.

Mr Kelly spoke to Bryan Dobson on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland about his article and how the transfer not only needs Vatican approval, it also needs the permission of the Archbishop of Dublin – which has been given by Diarmuid Martin.

However, he said “this isn’t over by a long shot” and later noted that because Diarmuid Martin is due to retire next April, his successor could take a different view to Archbishop Martin.

During the interview, the Health Minister Simon Harris allegedly tweeted Morning Ireland saying “Eh……no nun will be on the board”.

This tweet has since been deleted.

 

From the interview:

Michael Kelly: “They call it, in Canon Law, the alienation of the property. And that stands whether the land is sold or as in this case it’s being given as a free transfer. The nuns, because it’s over the value of €3.5million, they need permission of ecclesiastical authorities so in the first instance, you’re absolutely correct, that the Archbishop of Dublin.

“And he’s already given his permission and he’s actually recommended to the Vatican that they give approval as well. Now it’s in Rome at the moment and Rome is coming under increased pressure I suppose, lobbying in fact going on, to try to get them to block this proposal.

“Precisely because the new National Maternity Hospital, as [Health Minister] Simon Harris has pointed out will facilitate every procedure that is legal in the State.

“Now since the amendment to the Constitution that obviously now means abortions, terminations of pregnancies, which the Catholic church has pretty clear and consistent opposition to so that’s really where the lobbying is coming from, to try to get the Vatican, the Roman Curia to block this proposal.

“The sisters say it’s imminent, I understand from Rome that they’re not in any hurry to do anything about it. But part of the confusion I suppose is that a lot of the discussions around this has been saying that Vatican permission is not necessary. The law is very clear on it – Canon Law does require Vatican permission. This is church-owned property, it’s not something that the sisters can grant to anyone without the approval of their superiors.”

Dobson: “So where’s this lobbying coming from, who’s involved? Who’s saying that this transfer should be blocked?”

Kelly: “So some of the lobbying that’s going on is coming from moral theologians in Rome for example. One of the people we’re quoting in the newspaper this week is a Professor Kevin O’Reilly, he’s an Irish man but he’s a professor at the Angelicum University in Rome and he’s arguing that this shouldn’t take place, precisely because it would mean that this land would be transferred. He’s saying that that would be directly facilitating abortions to take place.

“He’s basically saying if the State wants to abortions to take place at a new National Maternity Hospital, they should find their own site. I understand that also quite a number of people here, particularly people who’ve been involved on the pro-life side of these debates have been writing to the Vatican ambassador in Dublin, the Papal Nuncio, asking him to make representations to Rome on the issue as well.

“So it’s not over by a long shot.”

Dobson: “Opponents of the move, or at least the new structure that would be in place, for example, Peter Boylan, former Master of the National Maternity Hospital, say that significant problems arise in relation to this new entity would be managed, would be governed, would be put together.

“The Religious Sisters of Charity will still have a presence, he argues, a controlling role in the new board. How will that square with how the Vatican would see this arrangement.”

Kelly: “You see, Simon Harris is trying to give the impression here that this is all going to be very straight, that you known you can have the Religious Sisters of Charity on the board and that will mean that everything that takes place there will comply with current legislation. The difficulty that arises there is, you know, the issue of abortion, is a very, very grave one for the Catholic Church. The Vatican is certainly not going to stand over a situation whereby the sisters are involved in a hospital where abortions are taking place.

“This doesn’t happen in any Catholic hospital in any part of the world.

“So I think there’s a vagueness there, around the structures that probably needs to be clarified but certainly the Vatican will not permit a situation whereby a Catholic institution, even if it’s only Catholic in name, is involved in the provision of the termination of pregnancy.”

Dobson: “We had a statement from Minister Simon Harris. He said that in advance of building works commencing, all outstanding issues would need to be resolved and he’d like to see progress on these as quickly as possible but he could be waiting.”

Kelly: “I think he very well will be waiting because I think the Vatican are not going to do anything in a hurry. Remember the Archbishop of Dublin is due to retire in April with his retirement that creates a whole new page and a successor could think something very, very differently from Diarmaid Martin.”

Listen back in full here.

Vatican urged to block nuns’ hospital transfer (Michael Kelly, The Irish Catholic)

Yesterday: Waiting For The Vatican

Tweet pic: Ronan Kennedy