Mr. Kevin McCarthy:

No, that budget is already coming under pressure. There is a €28 million fund for White Paper implementation. It remains to be seen whether that will come under pressure but the overall budget for international protection will come under significant pressure this year simply as a result of the numbers that are already materialising, with 4,500 arrivals to date up to the end of May, when the €230 million would have been predicated on the assumption of 3,500 over the 12-month period. There is a significant uplift in demand for international protection and this is quite separate from the Ukrainian demand, just to be very clear on that. These are people who, under the EU directive, are seeking protection here. Obviously, there is a context in terms of the UK environment and so on, which may well be impacting. We are trying to understand the factors behind that and what the future trajectory looks like, based on what we are seeing over recent months and, indeed, in terms of the assumptions behind the White Paper implementation plan because that has implications if this is a new scale of activity that we are seeing.

There are obviously going to be budgetary implications in the immediate term. There are also procurement implications in terms of our capacity to respond to the emergency demand as it presents, and there are challenges in terms of being able to meet that scale of demand over the coming months and years, if that is what continues to materialise.