Tufton tackled over Cornwall - Renovation delays ‘classic example’ of bungled bureaucracy, say experts

WESTERN BUREAU:

Health and Wellness Minister Dr Christopher Tufton has come under a torrent of criticism from construction and engineering interests for claiming that Jamaica lacks the technical expertise to handle major renovation projects such as the three-year-long rehabilitation of Cornwall Regional Hospital.

The Jamaica Institution of Engineers (JIE) and the major umbrella group of construction stakeholders have slammed the minister as misguided, with one expert deeming Cornwall “a messy, messy project” that had all the hallmarks of bad planning and cavalier spending.

Don Mullings, managing director of M&M Construction, the firm that carried out repairs to the roof of the 400-bed Type A hospital, considers offensive the minister’s characterisation of contractors as being out of their depth. He argues that contractors cannot deliver outside their mandate.

“Contractors work to instructions … they can only do what they are engaged to do,” Mullings told The Gleaner on Thursday.

“Even the brightest contractor, you can’t go there when they hire you to put on doors, and suddenly, you go there to take off the roof.”

Addressing a Gleaner Editors’ Forum last Friday, Tufton blamed the many missed deadlines at CRH on local contractors. He disclosed that the Government would be tapping expertise in the overseas markets to complete restoration work on Cornwall.

“The truth is, we have not built a hospital in Jamaica for nearly 30 years,” said Tufton. “A hospital is not an apartment building. It involves a lot more complicated moving parts … airflow, sanitisation issues … and we just don’t have the local experience.”

However, Glaister Ricketts, president of the JIE, has rebuked the minister, insisting that the Cornwall reno is standard project management.

“In principle, that’s an easy operation,” said Ricketts of the protracted hospital repairs.

“Look around the country – a lot of new and technical buildings are going up, so there is no truth in that.”

Cornwall Regional’s scope of work, initially centred on a heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning system on the first floor, has snowballed into a mass of mechanical, electrical, and plumbing renovations.

Phase Two is expected to cost about $1 billion, and Phase Three, which will go to international tender, $3 billion.

Ricketts said that Cornwall was the poster child of state bureaucratic projects – “a classic example” of runaway spending on an undertaking that was not properly scoped.

“The Government enters into a contract with a particular contractor, whether it’s M&M or any other contractor, to do certain specified work,” the engineers’ head told The Gleaner.

“ ... As soon as the contractor gets on site, the client, whether it’s Government or private people – but the Government is famous for it – they suddenly increase the scope of work. Sometimes it doubles,” he quipped.

ABSOLUTE RUBBISH!

Lenworth Kelly, president of the Incorporated Masterbuilders Association of Jamaica (IMAJ), also contradicted Tufton, arguing that local expertise has figured in the health-sector construction, citing the May Pen and Mandeville public hospitals as proof of projects done successfully by Jamaicans.

“That’s absolutely rubbish!” said Kelly, in defending local technical expertise. “Of course, we have the technical expertise among our local contractors who can rehabilitate and build a hospital.”

Kelly is also calling on the health minister to publicly name the contractors who have been engaged at CRH, hinting that overseas interests might be among the experts solicited. He said the minister’s blanket denunciation of local talent tarnished the entire construction industry – a workforce topping 100,000, according to Kelly’s estimates.

“It is easy to jump up and make pronouncements and say people are not good … . The next day you might hear that our doctors are not good or our lawyers and teachers not good.”