Mr. Bernard Gloster:

There has rightly been a lot of focus, in the context of the discussions about Sláintecare, on regional health areas and regional structures and on moving an appropriate level of capacity and decision-making to improve the timeliness of decision-making to that regional and local level. That is a balancing part of that. However, a fundamental part of that change is also to deal with the centre of the HSE; not just the size of it, but its purpose and function. There will always be a centre of some type, and it is coming to what the appropriate size and structure for that is. At the moment, because a lot of the decision-making and prioritisation has been centralised - understandably, for a period of years - the centre has grown into that very significant, what I would call top-heavy, system. I have made some changes to try to rebalance that in order that we can start to get to some regional inclusion in decision-making, even ahead of the RHAs.