David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and his staff. With regard to the headline figure, that is, the total gross provision figure of €22.13 billion, how much of that does he anticipate will form the baseline for next year as we look towards budget 2022? Obviously, a portion of it is Covid-related and allocated to dealing with issues such as testing, contact tracing, personal protective equipment, quarantine and all of those measures. I assume some of this will be with us for some time to come; it will not disappear any time soon. However, there may come a need to scale back these measures. In terms of the overall expenditure, is it the Minister's intention to keep that figure of €22 billion as the baseline figure going forward into budget 2022?