Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Yes, it would. But in terms of large congregated settings it is another one of the things that is happening.

On the final point, the answer is yes. The commission on care will be set up in the coming months. Myself and the Minister of State, Deputy Butler are very involved in that and have been looking at its terms of reference. It is to address exactly the points that the Deputy is raising. For example, there are no architectural or planning guidelines for nursing homes in this country so anyone building a nursing home can do what they want. The Minister of State was at one a while ago where they had glass balconies that were up quite high, which were not appropriate.

It was not the fault of the construction company. It had no guidelines. The commission on care is going to look at these exact questions. For example, what is an appropriate size? Something that I want to see, and I know the Deputy and the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, are keen on, is more public provision. We have moved to a very privatised model. It is about pulling that back. We want to reduce the amount of time people spend in nursing homes. As a result, we want to focus on home care and supporting people to remain at home more. One of the ideas we need to explore is whether we can expand the fair deal scheme to home care rather, than just funding people when they are in nursing homes.