Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North-West, Fianna Fail)

Good morning. I thank the witnesses for being here today and for the work they do. As other speakers have said, the scale of even the issues for which the witnesses are here before us is vast. I acknowledge the scale of the work they do outside of all of that. As the nature of this committee is that we focus on things that go wrong, I just wished to highlight that.

It is really unfortunate, as Deputy Ardagh said, that they are here before us today in a reactive way. That is not the way we want to do our work. Unfortunately, CHI has been at the centre of a controversy which involved the implantation of unapproved products in children. It is involved in controversy relating to surgery that may not have been required or was not required for children. It has also been at the centre of the controversy regarding waiting lists and the National Treatment Purchase Fund, which, as Deputy Geoghegan said, has gone on to have broader consequences. There is a broader question about governance, which I will give witnesses a moment to think about. I will return to that question at the end. We have to get CHI right to ensure it is not before this committee again in a reactive way. Like other Deputies have highlighted, that is achieved through transparency. The message for the board of CHI, which is not here, is that when issues come before it, it has an obligation to inform the other partners it works with, such as the HSE, the Comptroller and Auditor General, the NTPF and so on.

Focusing on the issues of the surgeries that took place and the different thresholds used in Crumlin hospital versus Temple Street and Cappagh hospitals, of the cases Ms Kelly mentioned, how many are being reviewed at present?