Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I know it has been a long day and I have no wish to be pedantic but, from the taxpayer's point of view, the HSE and the State are funding an individual to be CEO of St. Vincent's University Hospital. Whomever the relevant individuals want to pay to run the private hospital is their own business because that is a separate post. However, the St. Vincent's Healthcare Group's corporate governance and management structures and correspondence we have received from it indicate that there is a group chief executive and that this is the same person. Is it appropriate that a full-time public servant is double-jobbing? In Mr. O'Brien's opinion, is that individual double-jobbing? Let us make it hypothetical. If one were the chief executive of St. Vincent's University Hospital and one were also the chief executive of a group which, according to its accounts, also includes the private hospital, then one would be doing two jobs.