Ms Phil Ní Sheaghdha:

The most important aspect of the question is what we are going to do now. Clearly, the matters that can be corrected must be corrected. We are awaiting a hearing at the Workplace Relations Commission, to which the trade unions in the health service have lodged a claim regarding annual leave and the additional costs that healthcare workers endured in having to come to work and ensure that their children were looked after.

That is a remedy which should not require a hearing before the Workplace Relations Commission. The right thing should be done and done immediately.

Preferential treatment will have to be provided for healthcare workers. They are essential and we do not have a surplus of them. I have already set out how we are reliant on overseas nurses. We are not going to have the same numbers of them. We are going to be very short. Anybody who can come to work must be facilitated to do so, but not at cost to themselves. I know of one nurse working in South Tipperary General Hospital, for example. It cost her €150 a week more to go to work than what she actually earned.