IRELAND
Irish Examiner
Wednesday, April 19, 2017
By Catherine Shanahan
Health Correspondent
The State’s investment in the proposed €300m national maternity hospital will be protected and it will be free of religious interference, according to Health Minister Simon Harris.
The Master of the National Maternity Hospital (NMH), Rhona O’Mahony, said the hospital will “be clinically and operationally entirely independent in line with national maternity policy”.
Mr Harris and Dr O’Mahony’s comments follow reports that the Sisters of Charity will be sole owners of the hospital when it transfers from its current site at Holles St to St Vincent’s University Hospital campus at Elm Park.
The notion of the Sisters of Charity having sole ownership of a State-funded hospital sparked outrage among those angered that the order has not fulfilled commitments to survivors of institutional abuse.
The order had pledged an additional €5m after the 2009 publication of the Ryan Report which inquired into child abuse in religious-run institutions — but €3m remains outstanding.
However, the State has not “gifted” sole ownership to the nuns; the land on which the new hospital will be built is owned by St Vincent’s Healthcare Group of which the Sisters of Charity are a major shareholder. This does not mean the nuns could dispose of the hospital on a whim because the minister, who holds a “golden share” in the company set up to run it, can withhold his approval.
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