Ms Phil Ní Sheaghdha:

Yes, as Deputy Stephen Donnelly rightly stated, 69% of the nurses and midwives we surveyed indicated that they were either co-parenting with a healthcare worker, co-parenting with another essential worker or a single parent. In other words, they had no other options. That is a very high percentage. What did the State do? Through freedom of information, we had to seek the dialogue that took place between five Departments. At one point there were five Departments discussing the issue: the Department of Finance, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, the Department of Health, the Department of the Taoiseach and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs.

When we obtained the information through freedom of information last week, we discovered in the HSE and Department of Health releases that there is no database of the family status of healthcare workers. They stated that their estimate was largely based on CSO, Central Statistics Office, and Revenue information. In other words, they did not know the family status of their workforce or how it would be affected.

This workforce was the most essential to be at work during the first global pandemic. They did not have the database and still do not have it. All of the figures they produced around who would be affected and the numbers were conjecture. The figures they estimated for came to 8,898. When we met the Minister for Health, we stated it was a gross exaggeration and the figure was too high. However, all of the policies that were then sought to be introduced were costed at that level. We do not believe it was that high. We believe-----