Mr. Liam Woods:

To the extent required, the HSE will provide information for the group the Department has put in place to look at the issue of charging private income in public facilities.

That is more in the policy domain and the Sláintecare report makes recommendations in that regard. To the extent that we have data and can be of assistance, we are already doing it; that is our job. The committee's core concern about the stretched targets is whether they are impacting on public patient service provision in the here and now, the answer to which question, in my experience is, no. There are wider questions which are addressed in the Sláintecare report and which will be addressed in the actions being taken by the Minister and the Department of Health in that regard. To answer the Deputy's question, there are stretched targets which are not being achieved, but we are not reducing the level of service to public patients because of it. We are conscious that all patients be public until they choose not to be so, something that happens within the hospital space that the hospital does not control.