Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That is welcome. However, I am hearing directly from paediatric consultants who express very real concerns. We are in the middle of a recruitment and retention problem with consultants. We have about half the number that we need. We are about 40% below the average for Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD, countries. Children were marching in Cork today or yesterday because they have been waiting for two years for a paediatric consultant specialising in diabetes. There are a lot of issues around a lack of consultant specialties and subspecialties. One of the concerns raised with me in the last few weeks is that in order to get the satellite clinics open, consultants and paediatricians within the three existing Dublin-based hospitals are being encouraged, some might say pressured, to move from the three Dublin children's hospitals out to the satellite clinics. Can the Minister give an assurance that no such pressure will be applied? I wish to make sure the service level provided within the three children's hospitals will not be disrupted or pressurised in order to get the satellites open.