Mr. Ciarán Breen:

Obviously, I cannot speak for the Office of Wards of Court but I know that, historically, it was achieving in or around a 3% return, as advised to us. The Deputy is right that none of us wants to see a situation where the moneys for the future care of any child would run out over that period.

If we have the periodic payment or the statutory scheme in place, it is a much better scheme because we get the transfer of that investment risk to the State - us - which would be the provider of the periodic payment orders, PPOs.