Canberra Hospital master plan to be released in coming weeks

Construction is under way on the hospital's new critical services buildings and the government has remained adamant the $600 million expansion is on track to be completed by 2024.

Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said the plan would set out a long-term vision for the hospital's future.

"It's a 20-year vision for the future of Canberra hospital so not everything on that plan is going to happen overnight but it really will give people a great impression of where Canberra Hospital is heading," she said.

Earlier this year, the ACT government released two indicative options for the future of the hospital, offering staff and community members the opportunity to comment on the design.

The government asked people to consider whether larger open space or greater room to expand clinical services was more important.

Ms Stephen-Smith said community engagement on the master plan had been extensive and was second only to light rail.

The lack of a master plan for the hospital has been previously blamed for a long delay in completing the hospital's expansion, with the completion originally set for 2022. It has been pushed back to 2024.

Ms Stephen-Smith said the project was disrupted by the COVID lockdown but it remained on track to be completed in three years.

"We're really confident that the project is still on track and will be staying on its timeline for completion in 2024," she said.

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The start of construction of the critical services building was marked with a sod turn on Monday afternoon.

"The critical services building will give us a bigger and better emergency department, a substantial increase in the number of operating theatres, more beds [and] more capacity to that critical treatment," Ms Stephen-Smith said.

Over the coming months, there will be large-scale excavation works.

The expansion was approved earlier this year when Planning Minister Mick Gentleman used his "call-in" powers to accelerate the approval process.

He said this was to ensure there were no further delays to the project.

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