Wards at Mount Carmel hospital are in such a dire state that €1 million would not make a dent in fixing just one of them up, the hospital’s former head of finance said.
Speaking at a parliamentary committee on Wednesday, Sean Camilleri said a government study had found it would take millions to fix up just some of the wards within the hospital, which have exposed beams, cracked tiles and "condemned" ceilings.
"Every day I would have someone come up to me to say there is water coming into this ward, or there is an exposed beam in another," he said.
"It would take more than a million to even make a dent in fixing one up," he said.
"I mean properly fix it up, not just paint it over," he added.
However, he said, he had no remit to fix the wards, since his role was to be the financial controller of the hospital.
Multiple warnings
Mental health practitioners and stakeholders have long criticised the state of the mental health hospital. Last week, former Chief Operations Officer Paul Dalli said patients had been made to endure freezing cold showers because there was no hot water.
Earlier on Wednesday, mental health organisation Richmond Foundation said the hospital should be shut down “for all psychiatric conditions”.
Addressing members during a hearing discussing the Auditor General’s report on Mount Carmel, Mr Camilleri also confirmed reports that the hospital had lacking security and cracked tiles.
The Auditor General’s report found that Mount Carmel Hospital had issued a direct contract to employ 60 people for clerical work but ended up engaging 134 workers. Many of the workers ended up actually performing maintenance work and security duties, the Auditor General had found.
During the hearing, Mr Camilleri said he had realised the number of engaged workers had risen in a short period of time. He flagged the matter to the Director General, who said he would follow the matter.
Mr Camilleri insisted he could not provide a specific reason for the increase in engaged workers around the 2017 election, since he was not involved in employing people.
During the parliamentary hearing last week, the former COO had admitted some "clerks" engaged had been employed as "ladder holders and helpers".
Mr Camilleri said people were sometimes engaged to help with fixing up a tumolo-sized (1,100 square metre) ward. "There are only two qualified electricians working in Mount Carmel, but they could hardly change the wires for the whole ward," he said.