Hospice to be closed until 2022 for "extensive remedial work"

Friday 07 May 2021

Damp walls will see Les Bourgs Hospice closed for the rest of the year and in-patients moved to a ward at the Princess Elizabeth Hospital.

It is likely that the Hospice building - which currently houses five in-patients - will be out of action until early 2022 because of the "extensive" work that needs to be done due to continuing issues with damp walls.

First launched 30 years ago with funding from Greville and Lisa Mitchell, the site at Rue du Tertre, St Andrew's was re-developed at a cost of around £4m and officially opened in July 2012.

Les Bourgs Chairman John Guille revealed that, for some time, there have been "signs of dampness" in the ground floor walls of the hospice.

"Initially this was considered part of the drying out process of the new building," said Mr Guille, who gave assurances that the issues had never impacted patient care. 

Pictured: Nursing staff from the Hospice will continue to care for patients at the PEH, while support staff will operate from the MSG’s Andrew Mitchell House.

"However, over an extended period of time specialists have carried out investigations and taken hundreds of readings to map the areas of concern and to measure the level of dampness at different times of the year.

"The conclusion is that parts of the building are damp to an extent that is beyond what is normal in a new building."

Further tests have been carried out on the water and waste services in the building and on the underfloor heating, which has revealed that the building "has an unusually large network of plumbing services".

"The remedial work is too extensive for the hospice to operate in a normal way," Mr Guille conceded. "Which is why we need temporarily to move to the PEH for this work to be undertaken."

Plans are in place for the work to start in a few weeks and will reportedly continue "until the early part of 2022".