The Health Minister Simon Harris has ordered a performance review of all top HSE managers.

It comes in the wake of high numbers of patients on trolleys in recent days - today over 500 were recorded by nurses.

Simon Harris said he had asked the Director General of the HSE to rate all senior managers under a number of criteria.

Speaking in an interview with C103 in Cork, he said "In relation to the issue of performance management, I wrote to the director general of the HSE last week, reminding the HSE there are four metrics that every manager in the health service signs up to.

"One is financial, one is access to services for patients. The other is quality of service and the other is safety of service.

"I've asked the director general to report back to me very clearly showing how each and every manager right across the health service is measuring up against those metrics."

He finished by saying "I’ve asked the director general to report back to me very clearly showing how each and every manager right across the health service is measuring up against those metrics.”