Dr. Amir Niazi:

As a member of the HSE, the perinatal mental health programme is one of our success stories. No unit of the HSE would come to the committee and say it does not have a recruitment issue. There are challenges everywhere, but due to the hard work of Dr. Wrigley and the team, every person required for the programme has been recruited and is providing services on the ground. I also want to acknowledge the hard work my team has done.

All options are being looked at for the mother and baby unit. For example, when the Minister of State, Deputy Butler visited The Coombe earlier this year, she was told a unit was being closed and she asked us whether we wanted to develop the mother and baby unit there. The problem was that a mother and baby unit, which is a national unit, has specific requirements. It must be on a site where mental health doctors are on duty 27-7; near an approved centre; and where maternity services are available on the ground. Services for mother and baby must both be available on the ground, so we thanked her but told her it was not ideal or not where we want it to be. Options have been looked at. St. Vincent's University Hospital, Elm Park is a site we have recommended as it has an acute mental health unit, maternity services and all of that. The challenge with that site is there are two options. One is to build on a third floor site along with an eating disorder unit in that facility. The second option is to build it on a green field site in the unit and now people are discussing the possibility of putting the new maternity hospital on the same site.

We are between those, but we are engaging with the estates department in the HSE to see what will fulfil our needs because this is a once-off opportunity and we want ensure we can stand over what we develop and say this is delivering exactly what we are looking for.