Mr. Jim Breslin:

The reason for the new governance structure at the time was the movement of the project forward into delivery stage and the various strands that were going to have to be successfully managed in arriving at a point where staff, patients, technology and building were all aligned and operational and the project was complete. To give the Deputy an example, during the course of 2017, the Department of Health and the Minister brought the Children's Health Ireland legislation through this committee. That was passed in November 2018. By 1 January 2019 we had to have Children's Health Ireland established with a bank account and with the staff transferring from the three constituent hospitals on to the payroll of Children's Health Ireland. That is just one example of how various strands, and tasks being executed by one element within the overall programme, have to be co-ordinated. We were going to have to do that all the way to go live, that was the issue. We did not want to find ourselves in 2023 with a building complete but with the technology, the electronic health record, not complete or with the staff not having transferred. There was a co-ordination mechanism to put in place to make sure all of the milestones by each of the entities involved was to be executed. That does not take from the responsibility of the individual entities for the execution of the responsibilities they have statutorily been given but it is a co-ordination task that needs to sit above that.