Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I certainly will come back to the Deputy on those three issues. I will liaise directly with the Minister for Health and revert to her then.

I take the point about global figures and the need to make sure that we do not just use them and that we get under the bonnet. I would just say on the recruitment issue that I have endeavoured to do quite a bit of that in relation to UHL. By any objective standards the level of additional staff in UHL, relative to other hospitals, has been significant. That leads me to raise two other issues, not to be provocative but because they also merit consideration. One is how the hospital actually operates. There are serious issues in that regard and that is why we are sending a support team in. I think the Deputy Shortall is a believer in looking at all aspects of the hospital. That is important. The second - I have not checked on this in a few days - is that I believe this hospital also has one of the lowest uptakes of the new consultant contract. The contract has made a real difference in terms of separating public and private and it is disappointing to see some hospitals with a particularly low uptake. I would add those two other items to the three items the Deputy raised.

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