Ms Pauline McCabe:

On the cross-community issue, I made the point that it is every bit as much about perceptions as it is about realities. I believe it is established good practice everywhere that it is in our interests to have a workforce that is representative of the people for whom they are responsible for whom they care and to whom they deliver a service. We are in the middle of a major recruitment process in Northern Ireland to recruit new officers. A severance programme is operational and officers are leaving the service, while other officers are being recruited and already have started to move out into prisons and to become part of the prison workforce. The director general made a public statement not very long ago in which she expressed disappointment that the balance achieved, with regard to the people being appointed, is not what the service would have wished. As for the predominance of appointments, there have been more male and more Protestant appointments than there have been Catholic or those designated as "other". Obviously, when the Patten programme was rolled out, 50:50 recruitment was in place, which basically made sure that those who were recruited into the service, certainly with regard to the Catholic-Protestant ratio, were recruited in an equal measure. However, within the prison service, the issues of gender, foreign nationals, disability and all those other areas of representation are absolutely as important. Consequently, moving forward-----