Mr. Michael Fitzgerald:

I viewed and saw all of the information that was available beforehand, I discussed it with key people both in terms of the service provision and the estates perspective, and I viewed the available documentation. The documentation is in the public domain with regard to the expert reports that were made available by the estates division and, indeed, by the estates division to me. There was no disagreement on the unfortunate decision we had to make.

Many times people like me are challenged because we do not make or cannot make decisions or whatever, and when a decision is made then it can be a difficult one. I can say that this was a very difficult decision to make but nonetheless I stand over my decision because of the following considerations. First, were we to continue by putting money into a centre that still was not going to be fit for purpose and where the escalation of the issues that would be there with regard to the regulator were going to continue? We did not need the regulator to tell us that because we knew it from the actual reports that we got. Second, were we to continue to provide services in a building that was not fit for purpose without a plan of how we were going to do something different for them?