Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Sorry, 2016. I thank the Chairman. I want to put on the record that that information should have been disclosed. Whether any of us asked the right question exactly, in the spirit of open disclosure and an investigation into open disclosure it was very disappointing that the information was not released. Yesterday we received an entire folder worth of correspondence from that time. Who knew what within the Department? My understanding is that none of the information in that folder and nothing to do with this issue was escalated to Mr. Breslin. Will he confirm whether that is correct?

Mr. Breslin stated that in his opinion something of this sort would not be escalated to a Minister. Within this documentation it clearly states that there is a substantial risk to public confidence in the national screening programmes due to the potential of woman who are being informed going to the media and talking about their very tragic cases. Is the potential loss of public confidence in a part of the health care system due to what happens in the media and public arena not exactly the sort of thing officials should bring to a Minister? Given that is what the warnings were, why was this not raised at any point with the then Minister and now Taoiseach, Deputy Leo Varadkar, or the current Minister, Deputy Harris?