Mr. John McKeon:

I thank the Deputy. That conference was held in-person. Over the past couple of yours, many of the Department's conferences have been on Microsoft Teams, Webex or whatever. This was probably one of the first in-person conferences we have had since the restrictions were lifted.

There has been a high degree of churn - I will ask the chief appeals officer to confirm the exact number - and that is of concern to us. There is very little we can do. One cannot deny people the right to retire and when they retire they have to be replaced, which will take time. Having said that, there is still a continuity there. There are still people in the appeals office and we are still providing what I think is pretty decent training. I mentioned the level 8 programme with the National College of Ireland and so on. The staff members who are moving into those positions are experienced staff from around the Department anyway. They come in with a certain amount of expertise, so I would be reasonably comfortable on that point. Obviously, it would be preferable if the churn was not as high as it was but that is the world we live in.

On the medical assessor point, the regulations provide that if a person happens to be a medical assessor, they do not have to look for a separate medical opinion. That is another way of saying it. At this point in time, none of the appeals officers to my knowledge is medically qualified, but that is not to say that might not be the case in the future. That is something we would obviously keep under review but the process going forward will be that where a person on appeal submits new medical information, the appeals officer will be required to get an opinion on that medical information rather than relying on their own lay knowledge. That is fair and reasonable and I do not think there is any particular problem with that. Obviously, if they happened to be a medical professional, one would imagine they would have the competence to give that opinion themselves. We have roughly 35 medical doctors working in the Department and we would not want to preclude any of them from becoming an appeals officer either. I will put it that way. That is an enabling provision if that was to happen. There are no plans to appoint medical assessors in the immediate future but that is not to say it could not or should not happen.

Ms Gordon might pick up on the other question. I apologise to the Deputy as I did not get to write all her questions down.