Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

On the first issue, the Government, through the Chief Whip, will be glad to deal with the issue of urgent matters. The Government and the Opposition have proposals and we would be glad to discuss these with the Opposition.

On the second matter, I hope the health Bill will be available shortly. The Tánaiste was last week involved in discussions on this. It is hoped to have everything in place by 1 January, at the least to set up the health services executive and recruit the staff. Enormous attention has been paid to industrial relations issues to make sure that staff are facilitated and transfers are organised. An entire group has been working on this for several months.

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