Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

I assume the project manager is someone from within the HSE. That would be normal.

Deputy McHugh asked about the function of the project manager. As he will be aware because he is familiar with this, it is an eight acre site and the original plan in 2002 was to use all of the site. We believe it will not be necessary to use all the site and I hope some of the site can be disposed of to leverage the funding to complete the investment, but that matter would have to be decided by the HSE. Perhaps a public private partnership may be in order, for example, in the case of the primary care facility, where local general practitioners may be interested in being involved in the project.

I do not have the answer to the Deputy's supplementary question on whether the ambulance service, on which I will communicate with him, can proceed in advance of the project. I share his view of the importance of the need for an ambulance base in east Galway and hope the base can be progressed.

I want to confirm that when the Bon Secours Order sold the site there was a view it all had to be held for health purposes. That is not the case and the HSE has confirmed that. I am aware that has caused some confusion in the area. It may well be that a portion of the site will be disposed of and the resources leveraged from that disposal would be used to fund the project involving the community hospital, the ambulance base and the shared services facility which I mentioned earlier.

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