Ms Laverne McGuinness:

Vacancies can arise at any point in a hospital and they are referred to the consultants appointment committee, CAC, as part of the recruitment process. While this recruitment process goes on the vacancies are filled using an agency, so related figures are not accurate as they are not maintained on a comprehensive IT database. Such a database is currently being formulated. I can give the Senator the details of what we have, but figures in this area cannot be 100% accurate. Only accurate figures are published, so any figures provided cannot be published.