David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I understand, but this is an important issue. I will make this point. We are facing into a year in 2024 where the head of the HSE has directly said that the health service is not adequately funded. We know all of that and do not need to go back over all of that ground. However, it strikes me as incredible and unbelievable that the Secretary General in the Department of Public Expenditure, NDP Delivery and Reform would not have been aware of what health inflation was running at, or that the majority of the deficit for this year was recurring. We need to seek minutes of those oversight meetings that Mr. Gloster has spoken about. We also need to get any correspondence that was forwarded to, or submitted to the Secretary General in the Department of Public Expenditure, NDP Delivery and Reform from the Department of Health. We need to see those too, because that figure was set by the Department of public expenditure, not by the Department of Health or the HSE. It grossly underfunds the health service for next year. I do not think we can let it stand that the Secretary General in that Department would say he had no knowledge, was not informed and did not get the information, when it is clear to everybody that the information would have been provided. We need to get the paperwork for that, which I am sure will prove the information was provided. I am asking the clerk to the committee if that can be followed up.