Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

Although Professor Drumm is a paediatrician he is not involved in making decisions on this matter. Any suspicions to the contrary are incorrect. Four hospitals in Dublin deal with tertiary children's facilities. We planned to build a new hospital for Temple Street Hospital, in conjunction with the new Mater development, and redevelop Crumlin Hospital. It was appropriate to have someone examine the best interests of sick children. McKinsey and Company were asked to do so, considered 25 places in the world and decided that for a population of 4.2 million people we needed one facility with 300 beds instead of the 650 beds planned for Crumlin and Temple Street at a cost of €750 million.

With a small population we cannot have specialists dealing exclusively with children and many will deal with transplants and surgery in adults. For this reason, and to aid research, a new children's hospital should be co-located with an adult hospital. Physicians could work on adults and children, research could be combined and synergy would result. After the report was received hospitals were briefed on the report and everyone, including Tallaght Hospital, Beaumont Hospital, Crumlin Hospital and Temple Street Hospital, welcomed the report.

Because of the rebuilding of the Mater, I did not wish a long period to pass before we could bring certainty to the decision and I decided a two month period should be allowed for a group comprising the HSE——

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