Ms Fiona Tierney:

There is no difficulty with that at all.

I will move on to the Keane report on medical consultant recruitment. At the end of 2015, we were invited by the HSE to participate in a group chaired by Professor Frank Keane to review the overall recruitment and retention of medical consultants. Over the course of 2016 we attended a range of meetings, providing knowledge and expertise in recruitment matters with a key recommendation that a comprehensive job analysis be carried out on the role of medical consultants. We were successful in providing this recommendation in the published report in February 2017. We commenced a procurement process to retain an external partner to conduct a job analysis of the role of a medical consultant in the Irish healthcare system in October 2016. The analysis involves a systematic review of the key knowledge, skills and abilities required for the role. This process is now coming towards a conclusion. I have included in the submission a statement of activity levels which, in the interests of time, I will not go through with the committee.

To conclude, I assure the committee that we are committed to high standards in all of our recruitment work, which includes the recruitment of medical consultants. Should there be any matters relating to recruitment in this area which the committee believes we should address by way of continuous improvement, we will give these our full consideration. I trust this statement is of assistance and I am happy to discuss the issues arising.