Ms Lucy Nugent:

No problem at all. I fully recognise that we have to rebuild both our reputation and the trust that we need – that of the public, our patients and our staff. The future is bright. We have an amazing building, but a building does not deliver care, the people do. The most important thing is to ensure that we attract, retain and develop the best staff that we can to provide the best care that we can. That is just not what we are doing now; it is what we can do in the future. There is the opportunity to bring together all these fantastic staff from multiple sites into one location and two satellite centres. That will enable us to repatriate some things that are sent abroad from a diagnostic or care point of view. That is important because having to travel when you have a sick child is stressful even if it is from Donegal or Cork, let alone getting on a plane or boat.

We want to expand and develop our services. We want to have research and innovation at the centre of what we do. Medicine and healthcare continues to evolve at a rapid pace and I want to make sure our staff are aware of what we can offer our families in a safe way and in a quality-driven way to drive outcomes. We are focusing on that more. We are learning how we can do better. Our parents, children and young people are part of that process, as well as everyone around this table.

As I said, I could talk about the transformation programme, but I think we are running out of time. There is an extensive transformation programme led by my colleague, Ms Julia Lewis, which ensures that staff are ready.

This is a unique and transformational opportunity for the State and for us in CHI. We are merging three entities with three cultures but with shared values. We are going into an amazing building. We will be fully digital. That is challenging but we are up for that challenge. Equally, we are being well prepared through our Eolas education and training programme. There is a tried and tested methodology. For example, one is called a go-live readiness assessment. I would hand over to Ms Lewis, but we have run out of time.