Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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Question 91: To ask the Minister for Health and Children if, in her plans for co-located private and public hospitals, she has considered the way highly specialised medical personnel can be available to both public and private patients where there may be only one person with the specific expertise to treat relatively uncommon conditions or complications; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [24002/07]

Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)
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The co-location initiative is designed to ensure that private beds in public hospitals are freed up for the use of public patients by having co-located private hospitals built on public hospital sites. In service terms, this means that the co-located facility will be required to treat all the private patients that are currently treated in the public hospital subject to limited exceptions, for example maternity, A&E, radiation oncology or organ transplantation services. In these exceptional cases, the public hospital will continue to provide such services to private as well as public patients.

Specifically in the case of A & E, there will be one service on the hospital site and under the new consultants' contract, no private patient fees will be chargeable to patients attending there. The Project Agreement between the Health Service Executive and the private partner will require the latter to have sufficient staff and other resources available to enable it to discharge its obligations.