Mr. Bernard Gloster:

In relation to health and social care professionals across OT, physiotherapy, speech and language, and then some of the more discrete therapy areas, to be fair to the Department of further and higher education and the Government, every line of increasing the number of clinical placements is being pursued. Everyone we can capture to hire, we are capturing, literally, to hire and we are doing what we can. Unless we change the way we deliver therapy and social care services to people, we will never meet the demand. That is why we have to change how we approach it. I am concerned at the number of therapists who are caught in that space between spending their time meeting assessment requirements, which are very important and never should be denied, but looking at the amount of time spent in the assessment space and the amount of time available for therapy space, it is a very hard struggle. Speech and language therapy is required in older persons' services, stroke, in different parts of acute medicine, in children's services, in mental health services, and in CAMHS. It is a discipline that is applicable but unfortunately that means everybody is looking for them and there are only so many of them. I do very much welcome the Government's increase in allied health professional places. We are going to have to keep increasing that supply.