Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

That is a pity. I believed the Minister of State might think about the amendments again, in particular amendment No. 4, which deals with borrowing. I cannot and should not be able to foresee a situation where a children's hospital would be required to borrow to meet its day-to-day expenditure. It would be a sad day for Ireland if that were to be the case. However, we can all see the basket case that is the funding of hospitals, given that every year they are left short of what is required to meet capital expenditure. For example, in recent years the Minister for Finance has had to come into the House with a supplementary budget. This is due to incompetence in drawing up the exact figure required. We would not see this happen in the future if the children's hospital was told that it would not be given a supplementary budget and that it would have to borrow for three or six months until the time of the next budget. If that were to happen, we would have to work out how to give it money for that year and the following year at the same time, or else ask it to tighten its spending. That is what it is being asked to do. The amendment we have put forward suggests we leave out the reference to borrowing for current expenditure purposes.

Amendment No. 3 deals with a strange issue. The Minister of State has admitted that it is being inserted to keep options open, which is not a good enough reply. I raised the question of when we would see Children's Health Ireland having the ability to become a company and use a corporate identity. It is a hospital with a hospital board, of which we need to be aware. As I said, it is to provide paediatric healthcare services, not to be a corporate entity.

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