Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I thank both of the witnesses for coming along. Those last few comments are demoralising, to say the least, where Professor McCormack talked about everything being chaotic and much of this is down to the tendency towards privatisation in recent years in the health service. I would not disagree with Professor McCormack on that at all.

They made the point that nothing is working from the point of view of paediatric orthopaedics at present. I do not know what they propose, and I am not necessarily saying it is their job to propose it, but what are the proposals for solving these problems and having a proper system?

Mr. Green referred to the plan for Cappagh hospital. We have not seen that and I would be interested in doing so. How quickly could things be geared up at that hospital to provide a reasonably good service? That is all we can hope for in the short term. How many additional public surgeons need to be employed full time, or the equivalent of full time, and what needs to happen in terms of theatre space and ICU beds at Cappagh?