Mr. Kevin McCarthy:

As the Deputy knows, the White Paper commits to ending direct provision by the end of 2024. The Minister has continually restated his absolute commitment to meeting that objective. Some of the assumptions on which the White Paper was based and on which the implementation plan was based are now coming under a bit of stress because of the numbers we are seeing. We are conducting an exercise now with the other partners on the programme board who are representative of NGOs, service users and other Departments and Government agencies to look at the implications and impact of those changed assumptions.