BHB and Paget Health Services sign contract for new hospital building project.

Bermuda Hospitals Board (BHB) today announces that it has signed a project agreement with Paget Health Services to design, build, finance and maintain a new building on the King Edward VII Memorial Hospital site. Paget Health Services (PHS) is a consortium of local and international firms with knowledge and experience appropriate for this project.

Chairman of the Bermuda Hospitals Board, Mr Herman Tucker, said, “On behalf of the Board, I am very pleased that we are entering this 33-year partnership with Paget Health Services; a three year construction phase and a 30-year maintenance phase. This new building is a clinical requirement in order to give the people of Bermuda the acute healthcare services we need going forward. PHS has provided an excellent design, construction, financing and maintenance solution that will give us the new space we specified. I must acknowledge the assistance of Government through the Central Coordinating Committee. The Committee’s support has helped PHS navigate the regulatory requirements and policies in various Government departments touched by this massive project, and to achieve price certainty. Certainty reduces risk and that means a better price for Bermuda.”

BHB Chief Executive Officer David Hill added, “I am happy to report that BHB has been able to meet every milestone on time and on budget. The Public Private Partnership procurement process is entirely new to Bermuda. An enormous amount of work has taken place over the last two years that will allow PHS to start work on the site right on the heels of contract signature.”

Robert Wotherspoon, Director of Paget Health Services said, “We are very pleased to have reached financial close and are now preparing for the commencement of construction operations. Achieving this important milestone just eight weeks after the Preferred Bidder announcement is a tribute to the developing partnership between Paget Health Services and Bermuda Hospitals Board, and sets an international standard for PPP projects. We look forward to the continuing success of our partnership, and to working together to deliver state of the art healthcare facilities for the people of Bermuda.”

Venetta Symonds, BHB’s Executive Lead on the KEMH Redevelopment Project added, “The project will provide significant opportunities for Bermudians once work on the site commences, as PHS hires people to work on the new building. Work to prepare the KEMH site for the new building continues, with BHB’s new substation and parking lot project nearing completion. We expect these to be in use in this month.”

Alan Burland, President, BCM McAlpine said, “As the local party responsible for the design and construction of the new hospital building, BCM McAlpine is delighted to be part of the Paget team and we are excited to have reached the point when the physical work commences. This is a very significant project for the company and for Bermuda in general. It comes at a time when the construction industry is depressed and a project of this scale over a three year period will provide a major boost to both the industry and the local economy.”

Minister of Health, the Hon. Zane DeSilva JP MP, said, “Bermuda Hospitals Board is to be congratulated on signing Bermuda’s first PPP contract. I look forward to seeing construction begin on one of the most important, and most needed, infrastructure projects in Bermuda. This new acute care building will give patients and staff the space they need. It will also ensure BHB can provide acute care services in line with Bermuda’s long term needs at the required international standard of care.”

The new building will be a purpose-built structure that addresses the shortage of space for acute care services detailed in the 2008 Johns Hopkins Medicine International Phase II review. The building will include 90 single-occupancy en suite patient rooms; Bermuda’s first dedicated day surgery unit; ambulatory care services like oncology, dialysis, and asthma and diabetes management; diagnostic imaging services; a new emergency room and a new utility plant. The new building will allow BHB to offer health and wellness services in an environment that provides the privacy, comfort and dignity that Bermuda’s patients deserve. It will also ease pressure on the existing KEMH building, allowing space there to be reallocated.

PHS will begin to prepare the new building’s site this month and construction is expected to take about three years, with patients being cared for in the new facilities in 2014.

The official groundbreaking for the new building will take place in mid-January. Cost information will be released in the New Year once relevant bodies have been briefed.

The full membership of the private partner is as follows:

Paget Health Services
Sir Robert McAlpine Limited
PFI Investors Limited
BCM McAlpine Limited
AECOM Limited
Swanke Hayden Connell
OBM International Limited
Black & McDonald Limited
IBM (through Bermuda Computer Services)
Ernst & Young LLP
Wakefield Quin
BF&M Insurance Limited
Macfarlane Wilder
Mid-Atlantic Engineering
Brunel Ltd.

Archives