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Kurt Sansone
The new hospital at Tal-Qroqq, with its ballooning cost, is top on government’s agenda as it grapples to control public expenditure but silence still surrounds the workings of the technical committee created to oversee the deal with the Mater Dei developers.
Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi was scant on detail yesterday when asked about the works at the hospital preferring to stick to the standard reply that high level discussions are ongoing between the technical committee and Skanska. “The negotiations on every item of expenditure are at a delicate stage and I cannot enter into detail,” said Gonzi.
The Prime Minister confirmed that the committee is headed by Parliamentary Secretary Tonio Fenech and also includes the Foundation for Medical Services’ (FMS) board members, Perit Paul Camilleri and CEO Manuel Attard.
Gonzi, however, did not reveal the names of the consultants on the committee and was not in a position to say how much they were paid.
Today, this newspaper can reveal that the committee is composed of three Maltese consultants and a British civil engineer.
The people on the technical committee are Dr Richard Camilleri from legal office Mamo TCV, Michael Ganado a senior consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers, Jacqueline Camilleri, who is a consultant to FMS and British consultant John Barr, who is a senior civil engineer.
It is unclear whether the two FMS board members who also sit on the committee are being paid for their participation. FMS is the publicly funded foundation under whose remit Mater Dei falls.
The agreement signed with Swedish consortium Skanska in 2000 is widely blamed as the main reason why the Mater Dei hospital has overshot its construction deadline and already cost public coffers more than the estimated budget of around Lm110 million.
According to recent estimates the total cost of completion could easily top Lm200 million, a bill that had caused former Prime Minister Eddie Fenech Adami to express deep concern about last year.
The burden is now being shouldered by his successor Lawrence Gonzi, who refuses as yet to speculate on a possible date when the hospital would open. Gonzi’s standard reply has been, “as soon as possible.”
Meanwhile, Mater Dei remains just a building mired in controversy, scandal and missed deadlines.
kurt@newsworksltd.com
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