Ms Laverne McGuinness:

I have two responses, the first of which concerns disabilities, particularly the day places. That money has not been allocated yet to each region but it will be available at the end of May in terms of the number of places and the amount of money required. The money is being held centrally to ensure it is equitable and allocated to the most appropriate places. We have a standards guidance document which will assist with that. Last year, we had a 99% success rate with those day places and we hope to have the same outcome this year.

The Deputy asked a number of questions related to the ambulance service. In our new format performance monitoring report we have a number of pages at the front with about 12 high-level key messages but all the other information is in the supplementary report, and the ambulance information is in that supplementary report which is published on the web. Unfortunately, due to a glitch the Deputy did not get the regional breakdowns. I have them here. I will give him my hard copy. I will also e-mail them to the Deputy.

The Deputy asked the reason we are using targets that are different from the Health Information and Quality Authority, HIQA, targets. HIQA was using targets of 85% in terms of its DELTA calls. We set targets this year of 70% and 68% because other jurisdictions have been using these indicators for years. We are still at an early stage of that but we believe that is what we should strive towards. Already, we are achieving 73% on our ECHO calls but that is not throughout each of the regions. As the Deputy is aware, the west is not performing appropriately.

There is a full 57 point action plan in place in terms of the way we improve our response times. There are critical dependencies in that. We have invested heavily in our ambulance service this year, with €12.2 million in revenue going into it. That is to do with adult retrieval, but particularly regarding our intermediate care vehicles, to which Mr. O'Brien referred. That will make more ambulances available to respond to emergencies. Some 25 new vehicles are on order from June onwards and 80 staff will come in to give effect to that. That will significantly improve our response times.

The other element which will significantly improve response times is a €23 million investment since 2010. We will have a brand new control centre and system whereby we will be able to see every ambulance throughout the country and to where they are being dispatched. That will ensure they are going to the most efficient location. We will also be able to see the length of time they may be delayed, and link that in with the hospitals. That means more effective and timely dispatch, thereby ensuring we will have more appropriate responses. We have approval for that system to go in place. Already, we are moving our control centres to one centre over two sites. We hope all that will be operational by the first quarter of next year, with much of it to be in place by the end of this year. Two sites have been moved already. Cork and Kerry moved last week to Townsend Street, and Navan will move in June-July.