Mr. Liam Woods:

With regard to staff planning, work is certainly under way in the acute sector. In fact, the INMO referred to it this morning. A safe staffing framework is in place and academic work has been carried out to look at staffing requirements by ward and hospital area. That work will expand to the community area. This means that this year, before the Covid situation arose, we were putting resources in place to increase the number of nurses across the system.

There is some work under way. It is a multi-annual programme. Nurse numbers in the acute area were up by almost 1,600 in June. That includes bringing in students. On the wider point, as was reflected in this morning's dialogue, there is a process under way, which has an academic base. As was referred to, it is based on an 80:20 ratio. That process will expand to other areas of service.