Who is popular today?

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly has said he will meet all the stakeholders involved in the National Maternity Hospital, including the Sisters of Charity and the St Vincent’s Healthcare Group, as part of the Government’s efforts to ensure the hospital is built on State-owned land.
The St Vincent’s Group on Tuesday said it is not willing to sell the land for the new hospital to the State because doing so would impact negatively on the integration of services between the national maternity hospital and two St Vincent’s Hospital on the co-located site.
Mr Donnelly said here were two separate issues; the clinical independence of the new hospital and the ownership of the site.
Speaking on RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland, the Minister said the Government wanted State ownership of the land but he distinguished between land ownership and clinical independence for the maternity hospital.
Mr Donnelly said as far as he was concerned full clinical and operational independence was the “priority” issue.
He said he wanted to ensure that such governance was “bullet proof”.
Mr Donnelly said he would only bring a recommendation on the issue forward if he had the best legal advice on the issue of full clinical independence.
“In operational terms it doesn’t matter who owns the land,” he said.
No Government decision has yet been taken on the ownership status of the new hospital.
The position since 2017 has been a preference to buy the land but in the absence of that, the previous government was prepared to consider long-term leases of the land.
However, it has been pointed out that at no stage has any final recommendation been made to the government.
Campaigners who want full state-ownership of the site have expressed concerns that the historical Catholic ethos of St Vincent’s may prevent a full array of health interventions in maternity cases, including termination, sterilisation and tubal ligation.
The St Vincent’s group has maintained the NMH will have full clinical independence.
Asked about ownership, the Minister said this morning it was his intention to meet all stakeholders in the coming weeks.
He said he did not want to pursue a compulsory purchase order (CPO) as it could take years and it would not be good for a “decades long” collaboration to start in court.
He acknowledged who owned the land was important and it was his preference that the State, the people of Ireland, owned the land on which the new maternity hospital was located.
Mr Donnelly added the statement from St Vincent’s Group ruling out a sale had not been helpful.
“My position is that the people of Ireland want to own the land that their own maternity hospital is on.”