John Brassil (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I will be very brief. I have spoken to hospital managers and I am aware that they are paying way over the top for agency staff and are not allowed recruit staff. I do not understand the thinking there. What am I missing there if the cost to the HSE of taking on agency staff is three times the cost of recruiting staff and why would it not recruit staff? The witnesses might shed some light on that for me.

I was reading through the documentation last night and since the start of this process I have been trying to grapple with the structure around the seven hospital groups and the nine community health organisations. Is that a working structure? One line of the documentation I highlighted states that congress broadly welcomes the recent establishment of the seven hospital groups and it goes on to say that it is something that could work but reservations are expressed in some of the individual presentations, and Mr. Eamonn Donnelly also expressed reservations. I do not think there is an ideal scenario but should we set up a structure, go with it and modify it to fix it as we go along because we are not going to set up something right in the first place as it is too difficult a task? I would like hear the witnesses' opinions on that.