The British Columbia government is now estimating that Abbotsford’s P3 hospital will cost 70 per cent more to build than it first claimed.
“The Campbell Liberals are rolling the dice with this expensive and risky private hospital scheme,” says Hospital Employees Union acting secretary-business manager Zorica Bosancic. “Not a single brick has been laid and costs are already spiraling out of control.”
When they first announced the scheme, Gordon Campbells Liberal government put the cost at $211 million. When they formalized the project and asked for bids to build the 300-bed hospital, they put the cost at $286 million. The cheapest bid came in at $325 million.
And now that the contract has been awarded, the hospital - still at 300 beds - will cost $355 million.
An HEU-commissioned financial analysis of the proposal projected that the public will pay $1.4 billion in lease payments to the private consortium over the next 33 years.