John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein)

To return to the issue of in-sourcing, I refer to the report by the Minister that revealed that in the 27 months to the end of March 2025, close to €100 million was paid out engaging external companies that use HSE facilities and equipment after normal hours. The report revealed that 83 serving or former health staff are acting as directors in 148 companies providing what are known as in-sourcing and outsourcing. To me, this raises a number of questions. When Bernard Gloster appeared before the Oireachtas Committee on Health, he defined in-sourcing as the practice of engaging external companies or third party providers to deliver services often outside normal working hours using HSE-own facilities and equipment. Would Ms Coyle agree with that?