Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That decision was made long before my time but I can provide my view, for what little that might be worth. My sense is that the sequencing could have been done differently. In other words, the changes were made and additional capacity was promised. My view is that the additional capacity should be put in place first. The Deputy will be aware that I intervened in Navan and Drogheda and said that although patient safety must always come first and we must listen to the doctors and be led by the clinical evidence and expert clinical opinion, we must also, if we believe additional capacity is required, as it has been agreed is the case in Drogheda, for example, put the beds and services in place and then make the move. I am not sufficiently familiar with everything that happened in 2009 but my best guess is that the sequencing of it might have been different. The outcome might have been different if the kind of additional capacity we are now putting in place in Ennis, Limerick and elsewhere had been put in place.

On the second part of the Deputy's question, that capacity is being put in place at a significant level. With regard to Limerick, the number of consultants has increased by approximately one quarter since Covid arrived, from 165 to 205. That is a big change and we are sanctioning more on top of that. The number of NCHDs has gone up by nearly one third, from 388 to 505. That is a big number of additional NCHDs and we will be going further. The number of nurses increased by approximately one quarter, from 1,600 or so up to approximately 2,100. That is just in the lifetime of this Government. It is from the end of 2019 to today. There has been a substantial increase in the workforce. I do not have the figure in front of me but, since Covid, we added approximately 130 beds into UHL. The Deputy will be aware that I turned the sod on a facility to provide an extra 96 beds. There is a second one, and a third block behind that, where there is space, and we are looking at accelerating additional beds-----