The hospital site. PHOTO: STEPHEN JAQUIERY The price tag, once $1.2 billion to $1.
4b, is now understood to be more than $2b. There is also a delay of about six months in the expected start of above-ground construction of the new in-patient building. Civis, no doubt like many in the South, reacted with disappointment, impatience and frustration.
The above-ground contractor, according to a Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora document last August, was forecast to start in the first quarter of this year. Now, this work is expected to begin in the third quarter. Dear oh dear.
Where to start with a project beset by delays and uncertainties. Perhaps with National’s fanfare announcement in August 2017. Given the scale of the project, it would be "the largest hospital rebuild in New Zealand history".
In September 2020, Labour announced confirmation of design and a business case was being prepared. Cuts were subsequently made to save scores of millions, and a redesign was required. This blew the project out a year.
The redesign and the delays also, in effect, undermined any savings. Some of the cuts were then reinstated under political pressure. National, before last year’s election, announced it would reinstate the beds, operating theatres and radiology services Labour ditched.
There is also the future of other key parts of the project like pathology services that require clarifying. Not only is there the prospect of further delays, but Dunedin interests are finding it hard to get cla.
