Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

-----for the service they have given to their county. It is off the back of the growing and recovering economy that we are in the fortunate position to be able to increase the spend on health and to be able to provide the extra 40 beds in Tipperary that the Deputy is so good to mention. The €14.5 billion that was implanted in the HSE's budget this year is €608 million more than it was, year on year, and that allowed us to do a capacity bed review and to commit to 2,600 acute beds and 4,500 additional short-term and long-term residential beds of which the 40 the Deputy has just described are part.

I could go on and list all the other positive things we are doing in health but I think the Deputy wants me to assure him that the staffing required to make sure those 40 beds are operational will be put in place. I assure the Deputy the staff will be put in place. We are not in the practice of opening beds and not having staff to staff them. I was not aware the Deputy was going to raise the issue today so my information is not as accurate as it might otherwise have been. I will come back to the Deputy in the next number of days with the exact details of the HSE local area plan and how it is going to develop the opening of the 40 beds, what staff will be required and how we will recruit that staff to make sure we get it open as soon as possible.

See this speech in context