St Philip’s hospital is set to be formally wound up over €12 million in debts owed to HSBC bank.

Judge Ian Spiteri Bailey ordered the dissolution of The Golden Shepherd Group, which owns the long-defunct Santa Venera hospital.

The company’s sole director is Frank Portelli, a one-time PN leadership candidate. Since 2020, the company has been jointly run with two court-appointed administrators. 

Court proceedings detailed how Portelli’s company racked up a mountain of debts with HSBC, including over €5 million in interest payments.

Portelli had hoped to sell the hospital to the government in 2010 but the deal eventually fell through. He had also offered the use of St Philip’s in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. The offer was not taken up.

Apart from the HSBC debts, the company’s outstanding dues include €500,000 worth of unpaid water and electricity bills.

Portelli said during the proceedings that the hospital's energy bills had shot up by 190% when the 2005 electricity surcharge was introduced, and unlike industries, the hospital did not benefit from any capping of the surcharge.

The St Philip’s director argued in court that the company was still solvent, as  St Philip’s land alone is worth €35 million.

HSBC flagged during proceedings that The Golden Sheperd Group’s last available accounts date back to 2007, showing a loss of €160,000.

Portelli was in the spotlight last year after thousands of medical records were found lying around the abandoned hospital, which has become a haven for squatters.

Shocking footage had emerged online of a foreign YouTuber walking effortlessly into the hospital and wandering through vandalised operating theatres and shattered medical equipment.

He flipped through medical records and walked over and around broken furniture, scattered papers, syringes and what he claimed to be “human organs”.

Times of Malta had also visited the hospital while its front doors were still wide open and could confirm that nothing kept anyone from walking into a room in the basement containing patients’ medical documents, most of which had clearly been viewed and dispersed all over the place.