However, Deputy Richard Renouf said that despite his concerns and the public protests two years ago, his predecessor, Andrew Green, should not have removed the green space from the shortlist of sites before politicians had the chance to have a ‘rational debate’ about whether it was a suitable location.
Deputy Renouf, who was last week appointed to a new board that has been tasked with reviewing six sites previously shortlisted for the £466 million facility, said that there had been great public opposition to building on the People’s Park and that he foresaw years of legal wrangling before building work could begin if it was selected as the new hospital site.
And he stressed that it was only if the review panel found there had been a ‘serious miscalculation of the evidence’ – something which he said he ‘doubted’ would be the case – that the Council of Ministers would move away from the current – and previously agreed by the States – proposal to build on the existing site. ‘It is important to emphasise a decision has been made,’ he said. ‘The last Assembly had at least three debates about the site.’
He added: ‘It [the review] is not to choose another site. It is to look at the evidence to make sure the choice that has been made is sound and based on evidence.
‘It is not a case of reversing the decision – at least, unless it happened that the board and the Council of Ministers came to the view that the evidence was just not good enough.
‘I doubt that is the case. There have been various independent reviews by Scrutiny and independent advisers.’
The sites that the board will look at are: the People’s Park – which former Health Minister Andrew Green previously admitted was the ‘best site’; St Saviour’s Hospital; Warwick Farm; Overdale; the Waterfront; and a dual-site option.
‘Andrew Green believed it [the People’s Park] was the best site,’ Deputy Renouf said. ‘Clearly it is possible to build a hospital there but I could foresee two years of fighting about it before anything could happen.
‘I don’t want a hospital to be built in a scenario where a community feels divided. There was such vocal opposition at the time.’
The then Senator Green removed the People’s Park option at the eleventh hour in 2016 following public protest, but Deputy Renouf believes it would have been ‘helpful to have had it on the shortlist and review it’.
He added: ‘If it had been the States could have had a rational debate to proceed there or not.
‘They [ministers] had clearly put it amongst the lists of sites to be considered. I think we should have considered it to a greater depth and considered the mood and discussions later.’
Deputy Renouf admitted there were issues with building on the current site.
‘I think we must understand that it is not the perfect site but it is quite possible to build safely and to get a modern and efficient hospital here,’ he said.
‘If we had the luxury of time maybe we could go back to square one, but we don’t. It is important that we start to build soon. The present hospital is not in a good condition structurally.’
Deputy Renouf said that many Islanders were of the view that the States should ‘just get on with it’.
‘People feel quite strongly but their views are often subjective around lovely views, which is something to take into account,’ he said. ‘But there is also another body of research about the technical aspects of building a hospital, such as traffic flows and clinical planning.
‘It is often for these reasons that many of the sites have been rejected.’
