Mr. Rónán Hession:

It is demand-led. It is not the case that people will come in and we will say, “Sorry, we are out of budget.” It is demand-led. We will support people. It is more a question of how it is profiled in the central report in the budget. There has been no cut, budget cap or restriction placed on our ability to support people.

With regard to the trend of payments, we have seen an increase in payments in recent years. The biggest driver is local authority kit-outs, which sort of ebbs and flows according to completions. The other issue is that, at the early stages of the war in Ukraine, we spent a lot of money on clothing and essential items for people who had first arrived in the country. The number, therefore, increased a bit in a way that we were not necessarily expecting to carry on. I assure the Deputy that, in terms of people coming to us for support, our community welfare officers are not working under a budget cap. It is demand-led.