Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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To pick up where I left off before I had to leave, regarding the handling of the budget going forward, the whole principle of the RHAs is that the area is to be profiled. There would be an allocation of funding based on established need, population size, socioeconomic profile and so on. I know there is a huge amount of work under way in the Department on that. We have not had a briefing since before the summer on that. It would be good to get one soon. Where are we with regard to building that objective resource allocation model? Is the Minister aware of where we are at? Is there going to be any change next year in terms of allocation to the regions? The idea of the RHAs is that there would be a single management team and a single budget and then there would be discretion to spend that budget where it makes the most sense locally, given the age profile, socioeconomic profile, etc. Are there transitionary arrangements for that? Are we going to see any changes next year?