Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

As a follow on from the last question, it might be advisable to get that information out to GPs as soon as possible because the women who cannot get through to the helpline are trying to get through to their GPs and they are being advised that the GPs have absolutely no knowledge of what they should be doing. That is just by way of comment.

My first question is for Mr. O'Brien. He stated at the press conference that he found out about what he describes as a failure to communicate - and perhaps he might want to revisit that description of what we are discussing today - in the media. I am interested in trying to get to the bottom of this. A circular issued in 2016 is at the heart of the failure to communicate, as Mr. O'Brien describes it. It advised clinicians simply to add a copy of the audit to the file and use their clinical judgment on whether to tell a woman something about her own health and, in a case where the poor unfortunate patient had died, to stick a note on the file. When that circular was being drafted, and I understand it was signed by someone who was a member of the senior management team, senior clinicians and senior people in the HSE presumably were involved in drafting a circular of this nature. It stretches credibility a bit for me that these people, members of Mr. O'Brien's senior team, would not have communicated to him on an issue as serious as this. If we want to talk about open disclosure and being full and frank, I hope we can get away from what we have had in recent days, which is an endless round of people - mostly men as it goes and no disrespect intended to men - describing to women what it is like to have a smear test and how important it is. I do not need any of that advice. I have been having smear tests for 22 years, since I had my daughter. I understand how important it is. I also know it is not a diagnostic test and I understand it is a screening test. It would probably be helpful if we could dispense with having to repeat that.

Will Mr. O'Brien give me some information as to who would have been involved in compiling that circular, because to me it seems that it came from a very senior level? It strikes me as odd that it did not come across Mr. O'Brien's desk, but he is telling us the first he knew about it was in the media. Perhaps he can talk to us about who was involved in compiling that circular.