Ms Maureen Kennelly:

That was a concern of ours because we had been talking about this project for quite some time, well before my own time, indeed, with the Arts Council. We were at pains to communicate with individual artists and organisations about the changes that we hoped to introduce but I want to reassure people there was no effect on the service to artists. There was never a case whereby the system collapsed and artists could not be paid. Obviously, that would be carnage. That never happened. There was never a situation whereby we could not accept applications to the system because of the good work that Mr. Anyanwu and other colleagues did. I would underline that the kernel of this is about a service for artists and arts organisations.