Ms Eilísh Hardiman:

I concur with my colleagues, Professor McCormack and Mr. Green. We continued, and they continued, to work during the pandemic and during the cyberattack but a lot of focus was on the emergency, urgent and time-sensitive cases. Unfortunately, during that time we had to cancel elective surgeries for a period but that was for safety reasons on both occasions. We can clearly demonstrate and acknowledge that when we received the investments in 2018 and 2019 we made a difference. We increased the staff and reduced the waiting list for scoliosis treatment, and managed the situation an awful lot better. That was the position in January 2020 but, unfortunately, it has deteriorated since.

We have developed proposals for funding to provide access to care, and to increase the capacity of theatres in both Temple Street and Crumlin hospitals because that is where the majority of these cases need to be dealt with. We are also identifying how can we utilise that capacity at weekends. To make it sustainable it must be something that we are not just doing a few weekends at a time. It needs to be something that is built into Temple Street and Crumlin hospitals, and will expand the services over in Cappagh hospital before we move to the new children's hospital.

From our perspective, we can progress if we get funding. In fact, the funding has been approved and I assume that it will come through the service plan for 2022. We hope to have the fifth theatre open in Temple Street by July of this year. We can start, at the same time, trying to extend the theatre times in Crumlin but that requires us to recruit staff.