Work to deliver the new Baird Family Hospital and ANCHOR Centre took a major step forward when the board of NHS Grampian backed the project costings after a lengthy review.

It has now supported an update to the full business case for investment and passed it to the Scottish Government for approval.

Once rubber-stamped NHS Grampian aims to sign off a contract with Graham Construction to commence construction hopefully in January 2021.

A programme of site mobilisation activities is scheduled to be completed in the run up to Christmas.

Enabling works on the two-stage project were carried out last year but the main works were put on hold in July 2019 for an in-depth cost review.

Documents reveal the expected cost of the project had jumped from the original estimate of £163m to the latest final estimate of £233m.

Around half the £70m rise stems from construction tenders coming in higher than first expected, a further £15m arose from major design improvements, with the balance coming from additional cost planning and Covid-19 delays.

Project director, Jackie Bremner said: “Once the business case approvals are in place, plans for the main programme of works will commence with our construction partner Graham.

“This is an extremely exciting and important milestone which will allow the project to move to construction.

“It is also the result of six years of hard work for hundreds of people including clinical staff, patients, and members of the public, designers, and construction colleagues.”

Chris MacLeod, regional director for Graham, said: “We have worked closely with NHS Grampian over the last three years to reach this point in the project, we are delighted that the full business case is now being formally considered for approval.

“We look forward to continuing our partnership with NHS Grampian and delivering exemplar facilities for the patients within the North East region and beyond.”