Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

We do not have an answer to that question yet. It is a really good question. As the Deputy will be aware, the €4.039 billion breaks down into €2.121 billion for Covid measures, €1.163 billion for new non-Covid measures and €755 million for the existing level of service, ELS. I anticipate the ELS funding will stay at that level by virtue of what it is and the €1.1633 billion for the additional new measures will stay at that level. Obviously, that has to be agreed by Government but that is what I will seek and what would be normal practice. The next question is how much of the €2.121 billion relating to Covid stays. I do not think we know that at this stage. As the Deputy and I were discussing only yesterday, there will be an ongoing need for testing and tracing and genome sequencing. There may be an ongoing need for quarantine facilities. What the experts are telling us is that, globally, Covid will be here for some time, no matter how well we do in Ireland.