Professor Malcolm MacLachlan:

There is a national prioritisation policy. Every child is quite rightly a priority for his or her parents but in some cases there is a breakdown in family relations, feeding, eating, drinking and swallowing, FEDS, problems or equipment breakdown with people who have assistive technology. There is a range of issues that should be prioritised because they represent an immediate and significant clinical risk. Then there are lots of other things we want to get to as quickly as possible but that is the way to manage the clinical risk. Unfortunately, diverting scarce resources to those who are more at risk means those people who are less at risk have to wait longer. Sometimes that means they can then become more at risk because of the enormous strain placed on them and their families as a result of waiting.