Minister of Health Simon Harris has said the "unedifying spat" between the National Maternity Hospital and St Vincent's hospital does not serve patients well.

Holles Street hospital was due to move to a co-location site at Elm Park with St Vincent’s but a row ostensibly about budgets has delayed the move.

Mr Harris, who has visited the National Maternity Hospital, described it as an “entirely inappropriate, substandard building” and “utterly unacceptable”.

He has appointed Kieran Mulvey to mediate between the two hospitals. He said the mediation has commenced and “it’s important that we step back and we let Mr Mulvey and both these hospitals work on a solution”.

But he warned that the two hospitals “are voluntary independent hospitals and I cannot impose a solution”.

Labour Senator Kevin Humphreys who raised the issue said they were facing a "turf war between two hospitals, an argument over a budget. The argument isn't about the health and wellbeing of up to 10,000 babies and their mothers".

He said 10 delivery wards delivery this number of babies when there should be 24 wards.

Voicing his frustration at the delay, Mr Humphreys said a move by Holles Street hospital had been an issue since 1999 and was supposed to have happened within 10 years.

He warned the Minister to start thinking of alternatives if the mediation was unsuccessful and to consider a compulsory purchase of the land to build the hospital at Elm Park.

The Senator told Mr Harris that if the mediation was unsuccessful he will “have to face a number of bad choices” and he would have to pick the best bad choice.

Mr Humphreys said €5 million of the €150 million ring-fenced had already been spent on the project and “the whole possibility of the move is in danger”.

The Minister said “there is a not an apparent Plan B and that’s why it’s important to get it right”.

He agreed that it is “so frustrating when you have a project that is fully funded and ready to go”.

Mr Harris said they could be lodging planning permission for this project within weeks if they could find a solution.

He warned there is no simple option if the hospitals “walk off the pitch”.

It was an important project for him.

“We are so close to delivering a landmark project for maternity services at a national level,” he said.