Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Cullinane. Let us talk about where what is in place does not apply. It does not apply to consultants. There is no pause on consultant recruitment. I made this decision because it can take such a long time. We are in the middle of going from approximately 4,000 to approximately 6,000 hospital consultants. This is going very well. Hundreds more consultants were hired last year and hundreds more will be hired this year. They were funded through the budget.