Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael)

I thank our guests. It is great that this fine strategy is in place and getting started. I will ask some questions and make some comments and I invite the witnesses to reply to each individually.

Ms Baxter said that 17 family link workers have been appointed, which is great. I ask her to tell us a little about the geographical spread and what precisely they will do. Will they focus on the Early Start programme? Will they work their way around? Will they be available in an holistic way to families? What is their angle in terms of the way they will work? When precisely will they start? Are the link workers in the field now? People will be very interested to learn about the scheme because it has great potential, please God.