Neasa Hourigan (Dublin Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Sorry, I will have to disagree with Mr. Kane there. We have talked a great deal today about the size of the building and about room sizes. In some of the building reports we were furnished with, the room sizes are listed differently and various numbers are given. The request from the families was to carry out a review of the veracity of the claims made in the report, That review was denied. I do not think it is an unreasonable request considering that there are various pieces of information that are at odds with each other have been provided. It would be fairly standard and par for the course that there would be a review of the building reports.

If Mr. Kane wants to continue, I would like to take him up on his discussion around the future of the site. I would like to understand the figures he gave us in terms of occupancy. Are those numbers run for a 24-bed site or for a 15-bed site? It is completely unclear. I would also like to understand if the calculations were done on the basis of a single-storey building. That would probably be extraordinary in this setting.

As estates manager, perhaps Mr. Kane can address the issue of the size of rooms. He and I both know there is no statutory requirement in respect of the size of a room in a nursing home or residential care facility. I know that because I am trying to have it made a statutory requirement. We can have best practice but it is not enforceable. Saol Nua in Skibbereen has smaller rooms. Is the HSE intending to close Saol Nua?