Mr. Derek Tierney:

Again, going back to my response to Deputy Burke, this is about building ambulatory care capacity in its fullest sense. We recognised the surgical hubs were our most agile and responsive way to deliver a first phase of ambulatory care. This will really bite into our existing waiting lists for day cases and will provide some OPD capacity.

Our modelling shows that the seven plus two - there are nine surgical hubs - will meet that demand up to 2031 and, beyond 2031 and 2032, we need our elective hospitals or elective treatment centres to be stood up to start dealing with that broader demographic change. To be clear, we are fully committed to progressing design and planning in Galway and Cork as much as it is within our control. We have to engage with the local authority which will have requirements and we will have to tease our way through that.

As much as we can, our policy and priority is to go as fast as we can for Galway and Cork-----