Master plan 'failure' behind long SPIRE delays: inquiry

It called on government to change its attitude towards community consultation, through increased transparency and by dealing respectfully with feedback.

The committee - made up of Greens MLA Caroline Le Couteur, Liberal Mark Parton and Labor backbencher Michael Pettersson - was probing the planning of the government's SPIRE project.

The members, except Mr Pettersson, asked the auditor-general to undertake a review of Canberra's health infrastructure planning, and audit the government's community consultation.

The SPIRE project - now simply dubbed the Canberra Hospital expansion - has been dogged by years of delays.

The $500 million project was announced weeks before the 2016 election, but the scope and location of the project has changed significantly since.

The government last year began work on a hospital master plan, which was yet to be completed.

It raised questions as to why one wasn't completed before plans for the major expansion were made.

The committee agreed having a master plan in place in 2014 would have avoided the long delays the project has faced.

"An effective master plan would have considered issues such as the impact of construction on 'live' clinical care activities, where space was available to decant services from one site to another prior to construction, relocation of the helicopter landing facility and efficiency of moving patients from one function to another within the hospital," the inquiry report said.

"Given the rapid growth in health demand, the complexity of hospital planning and the time it takes to deliver new hospital infrastructure, this is not a failure that should be allowed to happen again."

The committee members - except Mr Pettersson - were also concerned the views of the local community were not considered through the planning process.

Committee chair Ms Le Couteur said the local community, clinicians and health care consumers had legitimate concerns about the project.

"They very reasonably point out that the SPIRE project has been started before a master plan for the precinct and it seems quite likely that it will have negative impacts on the surrounding community," she said.