Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Turning to Professor Whelan, I am sure everybody welcomes and shares his commentary in respect of the public interest. Can I put to him that in real terms his hand was forced, that he resisted, and that was evident even from correspondence from his colleague, Mr. Nicky Jermyn. We saw dispatches from him at one of our last committee meetings before Christmas and that he was unwilling and, dare I say, very unhelpful and, in fact, almost dismissive of the HSE as it went about its work in establishing legitimately whether his organisation was fully respecting and compliant with public policy and, if not, the extent of that lack of compliance.

May I put it to him, as a group of reasonable people who run a very fine organisation, though bizarrely structured - which is not his fault but rather Government policy in the health service - that was an unacceptable approach for him to take with the public authorities and the Oireachtas.