Mr. Peter Tyndall:

We are engaged in detailed discussions. I know that work is under way for the first tranche of people to be discharged and helped to find homes within the community. The point I made when I spoke to the committee, which I will repeat, is that this is the tip of the iceberg. A total of 1,300 people were in receipt of fair deal. We suspect the actual numbers were higher because there are other people in nursing homes who are not in receipt of fair deal. Work is beginning on identifying who those people are and what are their preference is. That work is under way. Various elements of the recommendations are being implemented. The point I want to make concerns the pace at which that happens. I told the committee previously that at least four of the individuals with whom we spoke sadly died during the pandemic. These people do not have forever. Their lives are beings wasted as we speak. The Government has made clear that the initial tranche is to be used as a pilot programme. That is fine. I have no difficulty with that - that is appropriate - but a pilot programme must lead to a much larger delivery. The scale of this needs to move forward. Work is happening on the statutory funding scheme for home care. We are working with HIQA, which is developing new regulations that will take this into account. I know from speaking with HIQA inspection staff that they are more engaged in talking to people under 65 in nursing homes when they are there to see if they have access to appropriate activities because one of the other things we said was that while people are waiting to come out, they need to have more appropriate activities so there is movement on every front. My concern is that it now needs to accelerate, which is why I am asking the committee to come back to this topic. We know about the so-called decongregation programme for people with intellectual disabilities. That stalled completely some years ago and those small numbers of people continue to come out. There is still unfinished business there. These are people who, by and large, do not have prominent voices in our communities. They are tucked away, which is why it is really important that in its scrutiny role, this committee stays on top of this as the issue moves forward.