Dr. Fergal Lynch:

In terms of the 15% of providers, we are still doing more work on that to understand the issue. We have not identified any serious or specific individual trend that explains why that is the case.

It is important to emphasise they are entitled to the various supports we have announced, including the capital grant and the reopening grant. We are doing more work on that. We have not identified a specific reason for it.

With regard to concerns that a high proportion of providers would close, the good news so far, and I stress this is preliminary information, is that our latest data from Tusla is that 18 services have notified their intention to close but 17 new services have notified their intention to open. It is pretty much line ball on that. We do not have an immediate indication that a significant number of services will close permanently and will not be replaced.

With regard to staff leaving the system and plans for the future, this is a continuing issue for us. There is an unfortunately high staff turnover ratio that we have been dealing with for some time. One of the big things we are planning is a workforce planning study, which had started before Covid-19. We were about to launch into a consultation phase just before the pandemic hit. We hope to work our way through that and rejuvenate it as quickly as possible.