Mr. John Hennessy:

On the community midwifery case, the clear objective here was to minimise the disruption to the client list and to the women involved. The original client list for the midwife concerned was 12 - there were 12 women notified to the HSE and registered - but I am aware that a substantial number of further clients have emerged since then who were not previously known to the HSE. We have a team working on this to try to facilitate as many people as possible with alternative arrangements. That is dependent on the availability of community midwives to take up this work. To put that in context, the volume of this activity compared with the general activity level in obstetrics is tiny.

There are approximately 200 births per annum, with approximately 20 midwives operating, but our intention is to try to facilitate as much choice as possible. More serious questions relating to choice will be dealt with as part of the maternity strategy review, with an open mind on maximum choice.

On the legal costs mentioned, the legal proceedings were not initiated by the Health Service Executive, HSE, in this instance, and we are the respondents in that matter, but further hearings are due to take place and I would prefer not to comment on that in view of those hearings.

Deputy Kelleher raised the issue of the dental list in Roscommon. We are checking the facts with regard to that but it appears some work is happening in the new endoscopy unit at Roscommon hospital which is disrupting theatre lists. We will examine the detail on that and try to make alternative arrangements to minimise the disruption to service.