Mr. Stephen McGrath:

We had a working group of health service managers who are close to the community and to the front line and we consulted those. We used the research we did with Ipsos MRBI to inform us about the services that the people would like. This strategy reflects the fact that we have a national team now under one budget. We looked at all of the work that they were doing. We decided then to target all of our resources to where they would have the most impact. The strategy is as a result of all of that work.

Previously, our team was working to regional managers, almost individually. This is the first time we have a national team together under one manager and under one budget led by Mr. Mac Aodha Bhuí and reporting to myself and Mr. Connors, who is on the national HSE leadership team. That is a big step forward. It means that there is much more visibility for the language. We will get buy-in for what we are doing. The strategy has been approved at the highest level in the HSE. We are at that starting point now and we will keep engaging with the public as we go on with this. As we have said a number of times here today, it is a first step in a process and it is an advance on the previous stage.

There was an attempt in 2015 to do a new scheme but that coincided with the introduction of the hospital groups and the community healthcare organisations. This involved a big reorganisation of structures again. We have a relatively stable system now at the moment and we have a plan for the next five years. We are working on an implementation plan at the moment so there is a way forward and some concrete deliverables and steps to be followed. This represents our plan for the moment.