In conjunction with the Business Committee, the Speaker has given leave to Carál Ní Chuilín to raise the matter of social service vacancies in North Belfast and West Belfast. Carál, you have up to 15 minutes.

Go raibh maith agat, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle.

[Translation: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.]

At the outset, I acknowledge that the Minister has had a day of talking about social care, but he is up for it, so he will be grand.

This debate is not about criticising social services. If anything, I am trying to make a case for getting additional workers into both constituencies. It is also about trying to get answers to how the recruitment and retention of social workers to fill the gaps in North Belfast and West Belfast will be achieved. I am sure that, having prepared for the debate, Members may have some of the information that I will set out.

In February, I asked the Department how many vacant posts there were for child and family social workers, disability social workers and out-of-hours social workers in North Belfast and West Belfast. The response from the Department was that there were 72 vacancies for child and family social workers; seven for disability social workers in children's services; two for disability social workers in adult services; and none for out-of-hours social workers. That was a total of 81 vacant posts.

In May, I asked a further question of the Minister, which was that he detail his Department's plans to recruit, given that there were 81 gaps in February. The Department responded by saying that health and social care trusts had undertaken a large recruitment exercise to recruit 200 newly qualified social workers and that the Belfast Trust intended to appoint approximately 60 newly qualified social workers throughout the summer. Minister, I ask that, in responding to the debate, you say whether those 60 posts have been filled. If they have been filled, can you say in which field they have been filled? If you cannot, I am sure that you can provide any additional information in writing. I appreciate that you do not always have these things to hand.

The Minister has said that he wants to end inequalities in health and social care. The topic of the debate is an example of where some of the biggest inequalities have persisted. Some of our most vulnerable families face additional pressure due to not having access to much-needed expertise and support when they need it most. One example that is persistently raised with me is unallocated cases. That concern is constantly raised with me by my constituents. For example — I will touch on this further later — during COVID, people worked steadily and at pace. When kids went back to school following that, however, the number of children who were brought forward and deemed as being at risk had severely increased. For a lot of those children and families, cases had not been allocated simply because the staff were not there in sufficient numbers.

As the Minister and all Members will appreciate, when families are contacted by social services, it causes fear and panic. Some may expect it, but most do not. That is a fact. When that contact is made and the case has not proceeded, it places additional pressure on the people who made the referral in particular, but also on the social workers. For most cases, there is a resolution, which is worked out in conjunction with the families, social services and others who provide support. The delay in getting an allocated social worker causes an awful lot of stress. That is not down to the social workers: it is down to workforce planning.

The Minister will be aware that, in May and June, social workers were out on strike. Some were on strike because of the pressure, but some were on strike because of issues around safe staffing and safeguarding legislation, which we desperately need. For the most part, their main concern was that they felt vulnerable. A lot of the stuff, such as other issues around terms and conditions and workforce planning, was, largely, unresolved due to staff shortages, sickness and the lack of pace in recruitment and, even more so, with retention.

I remind us all that the work that our community and voluntary sector undertakes to support some of the most vulnerable families is an integral part of the overall support. I would be shocked if you did not hear that during today's debates. As mentioned, since COVID and the return to school proper, there was an increase in support, which shows that safeguarding is working. Again, however, the system is trying to catch up. The community and voluntary sector worked in partnership with child and family teams to support families by providing fuel, food, counselling, emotional support and some short-term stopgaps. That was not always done through family support hubs, but they were critical. The issue needs to be sorted.

I know from my experience in North Belfast that the complexity of the issues that families are dealing with are deepening. You could have an elderly parent, alcohol and addiction issues or issues with waiting for children to be assessed. The list goes on. Therefore, the wrap-around support that is needed is more complex. Social workers, in my experience in North Belfast, have been integral in helping with that multi-agency approach, but I can see that they are exhausted. I see people who are already stretched trying to do their very best. Regrettably, throughout the summer in our constituency, as well as in West Belfast, we witnessed some very young children and young people getting involved in rioting and antisocial behaviour. It is regrettable that some of those children will go through the criminal justice system. When children are brought together through that multi-agency approach, that is normally when those interventions work. Some of those families are also involved in kinship arrangements, or they care for family members or provide, as I mentioned, care and support for vulnerable people. That is critical. The social worker is the linchpin in all that success.

You have heard about the lack of respite and support generally for families with children with disabilities. We all know that that is unacceptable. There is a lack of support for them when they are getting the initial social services contact and support thereafter, and they feel unsupported and alone. We need to talk about that when we look at the issue, and I know that that has been at the centre of debates today.

The issue for us is that children and families in North Belfast and West Belfast are living in persistently high levels of deprivation and inequality. The additional inequality is compounding the sense that there is a need for a whole-system approach and that, unless we get that fixed, there is just a constant cycle of misery. Nobody wants that at all.

There are unintended consequences. For example, providing sponsored day-care places is an initiative where social services, in partnership with day-care providers, try to help families to get children minded so that some of the parents or carers can get some support, counselling, parenting skills or whatever. There were not enough staff to make the referrals, so those children did not get the day-care places that they needed. The day-care places that were secured for social services went amiss, which has resulted in the day-care providers having to almost block-book because they cannot afford to lose those places. That was all because of staff sickness and people who were genuinely sick and perhaps even burnt out. It was not that there was no engagement: it was that that essential cog was missing.

There is another example of unintended consequences that have a direct impact on the vulnerable. When they are not there and there are concerns about children who are vulnerable or are at risk, what happens to that vulnerability and risk? Even working with the PSNI, the community and voluntary sector, youth services and social services, it is really hard to get people engaged, but, once they are engaged, there is normally a positive outcome. I would like to know how the gaps — the 81 vacant social worker posts — have been filled. If they have not been filled, what is the plan?

I take the opportunity to commend our youth services in particular and our family support hubs. They go above and beyond in North Belfast, and I know that it is the same for West Belfast, because they all work across the community and help each other out. They are keeping kids safe but keeping them well. They are the agencies that have advocated, along with social services, to have better outcomes for the kids, because that is what it is all about. It is about having better outcomes.

I will finish by repeating that our social services and our social workers need our support. They do not need us to pay tribute to them. They need us to pay them; they need us to look after them; they need us to introduce the legislation, guidance and protection that will ensure that they will be looked after. I am really concerned and surprised that there have not been any serious adverse incidents (SAIs) up until now, not because of any mistakes that they have made but because of the pressure that they are under. The pressure is increasing, and the supply of workers is not there. We need that to be resolved.

I pay tribute not just to social workers but to people who, as we speak, will be out, going above and beyond to make sure that those who are the most vulnerable are safe and protected and get the support that they need. While it is about gaps in social services in North Belfast and West Belfast, in the end, it is all about making sure that our residents, constituents and families and friends will have better outcomes than they currently have.

Thank you very much. All subsequent Members who are called to speak will have up to four minutes.

I thank Carál Ní Chuilín for bringing the matter to the House, and I thank the Minister for his attendance. I have been liaising with the Belfast Health and Social Care Trust on the matter and asking questions to get a true picture of the situation. I am not here to be a spokesperson, but I will relay some of the information that it has supplied to me. It said that the trust continues to be challenged in the recruitment and retention of social workers in the main and that that is due to a deficit in supply regionally. We will all want to say how much we appreciate the challenging work that social workers undertake in many complex situations.

In the Belfast constituencies, it was not clear that there was a particular deficit of workers in North and West, compared with South and East. The figures that I received were not conclusive, but the trust accepts that vacancies are an issue, with workforce pressures, including long-term absence, compounded by demand and capacity issues in the social work workforce. The trust referred to a Department of Health workforce review, which indicated the need to commission an extra 60 student social work places in Northern Ireland universities. I understand that the Department has agreed to fund an additional 40 university places for the 2024 intake to the social work degree. Out of 238 social work degree graduates in Northern Ireland in 2024, 200 have been appointed across the five healthcare trusts in Northern Ireland, and 59 are in Belfast. That includes five who studied outside Northern Ireland and Great Britain and have returned to Northern Ireland. They are encouraging our students who go elsewhere to return.

Despite significant efforts and investment in bespoke recruitment, the trust continues to have a significant number of vacancies that remain unfilled, most of which are in critical children's community teams, as the Member indicated. Other than a small number coming through the Open University pathway this autumn, it acknowledged that there will be no significant additional supply of social workers in Northern Ireland until the next cohort of graduates in 2025. That presents a significant challenge.

The five health trusts are seeking approval from the Department to pay an exceptional recognition payment to all band 5, 6 and 7 social work staff who deliver gateway, family interventions and looked-after children's services across the five trust areas, recognising the complex work that is being undertaken.

I turn to what is being done. Again, I am told that the trust has established a social work recruitment and retention strategic group. The trust is maintaining compliance with the Department of Health's directive to cease all use of agency social workers. Other efforts are increasing supply, but that is limited. The trust is seeking to invest in staff well-being initiatives and to promote a flexible working policy. Obviously, it supports staff advancement and post-qualifying training programmes, and it recognises that retention is an issue. Children's services has recently established a specific recruitment and retention group chaired by a senior divisional social worker. It is looking at additional Open University places.

Will the Member draw his remarks to a close, please?

Trust representatives attended the Manchester Jobs Fair to encourage applications from social workers who qualify in Great Britain. The trust also seeks to recruit social workers by looking internationally and among those living in Northern Ireland who have qualifications from elsewhere that could be recognised locally.

I thank the Member for securing the Adjournment debate. I read the two questions that the Member submitted, and I was in contact with the Belfast Trust, like many of the North Belfast and, no doubt, West Belfast MLAs who are here.

Today has been a day of discussions about health and social care, but we need to be particular in this debate about the reasons for vacancies in North and West Belfast. Members have discussed the poverty rates, and it is obvious that, where poverty rates increase, we will have more complex needs. That also makes us think that increasing the workforce in those areas should be a focused priority. Yes, those areas may require more social workers than other areas, but they also require greater focus on fixing the problems.

Ahead of the debate today and as part of ongoing engagement, we have had correspondence from the British Association of Social Workers. It provided a briefing. I will read out something that it said:

"engagement with senior leaders in the health and social care trusts indicates that the recently reported reduction in the social work vacancy rate to 5·4% is not reflective of the situation in many social work teams. We have been informed of current vacancy rates in family intervention teams of 30 to 35% and vacancy rates that exceed 40% in looked after children's services."

I highlight that because it is really important that we are explicit about the differences across Northern Ireland due to the links to poverty. Although I recognise that the Health Minister is here, it is not just his responsibility; it is the Communities Minister's responsibility as well. A number of weeks ago, we had an Adjournment debate on tackling poverty in North Belfast. It gives further weight to the argument that North and West Belfast need to be prioritised.

In the previous debate, the Minister recognised and highlighted the increase in training places. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be enough. Through engagement in our constituency offices, we hear that social workers who have had just one or two years' experience are now leading teams, particularly in certain divisions. That is not their fault; it is simply because they have no choice and cannot simply walk away. Some social workers now choose to work in the private sector, because doing so is more appealing and family-friendly. I do not doubt that a massive amount of effort and work is put in by individual social workers, but they are beyond capacity.

I will touch on Operation Encompass, which was rolled out by police. When a child has been present at a domestic violence incident, the police contact the school to let it know, so that it can put wrap-around care in place. Some contact that we have had with schools in North Belfast, particularly in working-class areas, suggests that, in many of those cases, the school does not know what happens beyond school because, again, there are unallocated places for social workers.

More burdens are placed on the educational system as well. I hear from teachers who have to ensure that those kids are, for example, not given homework because they do not want to cause tensions in the home. They are also bringing in extra food for those kids. They are aware that even some of those children do not have allocated social workers. Again, that is not the fault of individuals, but it brings further weight to the idea that North Belfast and West Belfast need a specific priority and focus. It has been the focus in the past few weeks when it comes to social care, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister about that area of prioritisation and what plans could be put in place.

I thank the Minister for coming to this afternoon's debate. I am conscious that we spent a couple of hours earlier debating children's social care services, and all the points that were made in the Chamber earlier are, of course, relevant now.

As Carál and Nuala outlined and as you know, Minister, North Belfast and West Belfast, the areas that we represent, sadly have some of the highest levels of deprivation in the North. Carál also mentioned the 81 vacancies that the Belfast Trust had as of summer 2024. I know that the Department was putting in place a recruitment process, and the hope was to recruit 60 new social workers. When the Minister responds to the debate, it would be great to get any update that he may have on that.

Regrettably, the feedback that we receive from social workers and families — I can speak only for West Belfast, but Carál and Gerry are here and others can speak for North Belfast — is that the situation is getting worse, hence the need for this afternoon's debate. It is really worrying that we hear directly from the mouths of social workers that "services are no longer safe". I do not think that warnings get any starker than that. It is really worrying. There was feedback related to the strikes that were held just before the summer, with social workers from the Belfast area saying that children's lives were being put at risk in the current circumstances. That is really worrying for all of us in the Chamber, and, hopefully, we can make some progress.

Given the situation that we are in and given all the limitations on the budget, there is definitely a role for cross-departmental working, and I know that the Department is looking into that. We need to seriously look at every option in the immediate term, given that social workers think that children's lives are at risk. Carál made the point: what are we waiting for? Are we waiting for the next SAI and something terrible happening to a child? We know that the system is broken. It is about how we can rectify the problem.

Carál mentioned that, like the rest of the health and social care system, social workers face burnout. We know that they work 50 to 60 hours per week and have additional stress, but, when I have spoken to social workers locally, they have told me that one of the biggest mental burdens is not even the additional hours and the excessive workload; it is the guilt and regret that they feel because they know that they are not meeting the needs of the people in the constituency who need help. They carry the mental burden that they are potentially not helping the people, families and kids who need help.

I will finish with some of the cases that I have been dealing with in my constituency. Some kids — some of them are really young — are dealing with really bad mental health issues and addiction issues. I am talking about kids who are really young. The social workers who work with them are, again, in fear that they are not able to give the cases involving those kids and those families the time that they want to give them. The other example is the families with children with learning disabilities whom you mentioned, and we must give credit to that BBC programme. One of those mothers is in my constituency of West Belfast. I wrote to the Minister about her and her son's case previously. Again, it is about how all those flaws in the system impact on the most vulnerable families and on the kids who need the help and support. I look forward to hearing the Minister's response.

I thank the Member for tabling the debate. The fact that the gap is 81 staff in North Belfast and West Belfast is pretty shocking. One gap is one too many, obviously. The fact that the gap is so large — close to 100 staff — shows that working-class communities in North Belfast and West Belfast are once again being failed, left behind and denied the services that they need to help them navigate the complexities and difficulties of life. I had not seen the answer to the Member's question for written answer beforehand, so I was shocked to hear those figures.

Given that social workers are overloaded with work, it probably amounts to hundreds of children and young people who are not getting the services and the support that they should get and to which they are entitled. Again, one young person not getting access to services is one too many, but, if hundreds of young people in North Belfast and West Belfast are not getting access to them, that is really concerning and troubling and something on which we should all be focused.

My concern is this: how many young people are falling through the cracks in the system? What is the knock-on effect on those who have been denied services, a social worker and support, with everything that that support entails? The Minister always talks about the importance of mental health: what is the knock-on impact on the mental health of young people, if they are denied services because of the high number of staff vacancies? Young people's development and that kind of stuff will be impacted on as well.

I share the Member's concerns about a possible SAI, if one has not happened already. Given that gaping hole in the number of staff working with vulnerable people and given that, as I said, people are falling through the cracks, I am concerned about a potential scandal or SAI emerging down the line. That really should focus minds.

As I said earlier, social workers have been out on strike over the past year and longer. I have stood with them in the Whiterock and Shankill areas. To repeat, they are in dispute with the trusts. They demand a recognition payment, a career pathway and a caseload ceiling. All of that is relevant to what we are talking about now. Some people feel that the sector is not appropriate for them, given the pressure that they are under. The Minister also needs to look at the domiciliary care sector and at the fact that so much domiciliary care is privately, not publicly, provided. People should not make money and profit from the provision of care.

Finally, we need to tie the Budget into all of this. The Minister's party has raised points and concerns about the Budget not being appropriate. The Budget also does not meet the needs of working-class communities more generally. It exacerbates deprivation, which will lead to more people needing social workers and using the care and support sectors. We therefore need to talk about what the Budget does not do for social work and about the knock-on pressures and problems that it will create for North Belfast and West Belfast in particular.

Obviously, I am from South Down, but, if there is any Adjournment debate in which I feel that I can participate, I will do so. As the son of a Clonard woman and an Ardoyne man, I think that I get to speak on an issue in North Belfast and West Belfast.

The SDLP supports the Adjournment topic and the issues that have been highlighted. We recognise that there are a massive number of vacancies, which Members have mentioned. I will highlight the fact that such a high level of vacancies across social services in the area can create a continuing problem. The fewer staff there are, the more pressure there is on those who are there. Those jobs become less attractive, and people then leave.

It would be good to hear whether the Minister has a human resource plan to respond to a staffing crisis. A crisis will beget a crisis that will continue to impact on the area. Having worked for many years in diocesan-based youth services that have youth centres across North Belfast and West Belfast, I am aware from those staff — I continue to hear this from them — of the problems and the scale of the issues for the young people with whom they work. There is a real issue on the ground and a real problem in responding to it. That is the sort of cocktail that will lead to problems. As Mr Carroll said, it could ultimately lead to some very dangerous outcomes, and it will be some of our vulnerable young people or our elderly people who will be impacted on.

I also want to raise the fact, given that it has been mentioned, that we have had a number of debates today on similar issues, so the issues are a bit repetitive. This is something that I mentioned earlier: if we are going to move into a phase where we have an adult protection Bill, multidisciplinary teams (MDTs) continuing to roll out, the Adoption and Children Act and learning and disability frameworks, there is going to be an even greater emphasis on the recruitment of social workers and that is, inevitably, going to divert some away from the roles that they are in at the minute, because there are just not enough social workers to cover the patches as it is. If we have this greater need for even more social workers, they are going to be spread even thinner on the ground, and it is the more stressful roles that social workers are going to want to exit from to take up the new roles. The British Association of Social Workers, as an example, constantly says that there are not enough people in training and there are not enough funded places for the training of social workers, which means that we are not actually replacing a depleted workforce. All roads lead to the fact that there are going to be continuing pressures and we really need to see some sort of resolution.

I look forward to hearing from the Minister who, I am sure, will be aware of the issues and no doubt will be able to give us an update on what the Department is doing.

Minister, you have up to 10 minutes.

Deputy Speaker, thank you very much. I thank Carál Ní Chuilín for bringing forward this matter. It is important, particularly for that geographical area. She challenged me about the 81 vacancies and 60 being put in place. I am going to try to meet it, but we might need to speak off-line because I might not be comparing like with like.

First, by way of context or background, there are around 6,600 registered social workers in Northern Ireland. The trusts are, of course, by far the largest employers: they have 4,800. The Belfast Trust has the highest number in post, and that is around 1,120 more generally. To come to the question that Carál Ní Chuilín has put to me: I signed off a letter to her earlier today. It is about a response on the number of vacant social worker posts for child and family, disability and mental health for North Belfast and West Belfast. In band 6 social worker vacancies, the Belfast Trust says that — it is very specific — in mental health, there is one; in disability, there is one; in children's community services, in whole-time equivalents, there are 19·3; and in children's homes, there are 13. My maths suggests that that is 24, and if we take that off the 81, it suggests that 57 vacancies have been filled. However, I accept that I might not be comparing like with like, and I am very happy to discuss it in a moment.

I understand and very much appreciate that all the trusts have been experiencing high levels of vacancies and other types of absences in recent years. Members have correctly identified the chief reasons for that. However, due to a range of actions taken already, some of which I will outline, the regional vacancy rate for all social worker posts has, thankfully, been falling, but that does not mean that the problem is resolved. I will set out the context, because it is important to note that, due to the way in which social work services are delivered, which is mostly in small local teams, any absences from those teams, whether through illness or long-term leave or because of vacancies, mean that there is a much greater burden on the staff who remain at work. I acknowledge that fact and pay tribute to all our social workers who deliver services to adults, families and children every day, but I also accept what Carál was saying. They do not want people to pay tribute: they want people to pay them and give them the correct terms and conditions of employment, which include a certain work-life balance and a recognition that there are appropriate and inappropriate stress levels, and that we ask too much of people. As I have said repeatedly, our health and social care services are delivered by dedicated and committed staff, and we should be proud of them.

With regard to Belfast in particular, I can inform Members that there are currently 41 vacant social work posts in the trust, of which 32 are in children's services and a further nine in adult services. That is for the trust in particular. There are also 21 social work posts in teams providing services to children with a disability, and six of these are vacant. I am assured by the Belfast Trust that it is actively seeking to fill all its current vacancies. However, we know that there is a limited pool of potential candidates available. My Department recognises that we need to train more social workers in Northern Ireland, and, to that end, we have been steadily increasing the number of commissioned student places in recent years. The baseline in 2021 was 260 places. That went to 285 in 2023 and to 325 this year. I secured the funding for those additional 40 places this year in response to the need for more social workers, but I should say that that increase is for one additional cohort only. So, given the increasing demand for social workers, particularly as new services develop and legislation is introduced, I hope that I can make a strong case for recurrent funding.

That brings me to the actions that have been, and are being, taken to stabilise the social work workforce, which is as important as increasing overall capacity. In 2020, the Department commissioned a review of the social work workforce in Northern Ireland, which reported in 2022. The Department now has in place a social work workforce implementation board, which was established following the publication of the social work workforce review. Led by the Chief Social Worker, the membership of the board includes key stakeholders in social work, and its aim is to provide the leadership and accountability that is needed to ensure the development and stabilisation of the social work workforce. Reform plans in place for social work include, for example, the production of a 10-year attract, recruit and retain plan that is aimed at maximising attraction into social work training; the implementation of an effective recruitment process; the development of strategies to improve the rates of retention; a growth in the number of social work training places by as much as funding allows; a continuation of the fast-track recruitment route for future cohorts of newly qualified social workers; and the establishment of an evidence base for safer staffing to develop regional guidance.

The social work workforce review made several key recommendations that are now being actioned. In December 2022, as a first and highly significant step towards reform, the Department, in collaboration with the trusts, took the decision to cease the use of recruitment agencies to fill trust vacancies by the end of June 2023. At that point, there were in excess of 200 recruitment agency social workers employed in the trusts, some of whom had been working that way for years. That growing trend of agency usage caused a degree of instability in the workforce. It also hampered the building of meaningful relationships, which, of course, is the essence of good social work. All the social workers who were employed by recruitment agencies were then given the opportunity to apply for substantive posts, and the vast majority did so. I am glad to say that no social workers in the trusts are now employed by a recruitment agency, which has been key to allowing the other reform measures to go ahead.

At the same time, early in 2023, the Department sought to introduce a much more streamlined approach to recruiting the 240 to 250 newly qualified social workers who graduate from our universities each year. I am pleased to say that, in 2023, that resulted in 208 newly qualified social workers joining the trusts. So far this year, 206 have taken up permanent contracts in trusts. A further 14 newly qualified social workers are going through pre-employment checks, and I hope that they will start in the coming weeks. In 2023, the Belfast Trust recruited 59 of the overall cohort of newly qualified social workers: 36 went to posts in children's services, 26 of whom went to children's teams in North Belfast and West Belfast. This year, the total intake in Belfast was slightly lower, with 50 newly qualified social workers: 34 went into children's services, with 28 of those going into children's teams in North Belfast and West Belfast. So, in the past two years, the Belfast Trust has managed to attract 109 newly qualified social workers into post: 70 are employed in children's services, of whom 54 have gone into vacancies in North Belfast and West Belfast.

I thank the Minister for giving way and providing those details. As the Minister may be aware, North Belfast is also covered heavily by the Northern Trust. Does the Minister have any information about vacancies in the Northern Trust, which also covers part of the North Belfast constituency?

I am afraid that I do not have the information that the Member is seeking, but we will certainly try to get that for him in the days ahead.

In the limited time that I have remaining, I will move on to the issue of industrial action, which some Members referred to. Productive discussions have been ongoing, but some issues remain unresolved. I recognise the workforce and the workload pressures in social work services, which, as Carál Ní Chuilín suggested, may be connected to safe staffing. The Chief Social Worker has published an initial report, 'Safe Staffing in Social Work Research and Policy Development', and, between September and November, discussions are taking place about that.

The key issues that I want to address are particularly, for example, the composition of social work caseloads in relation to the levels of staff experience. As I said, there are acceptable levels of stress in any job, but there are also unacceptable levels of stress. If social workers feel that they are not competent, well-trained and experienced enough to tackle the caseload that they are being asked to take on, that is counter-strategic. It is not good for the delivery or the individual.

Finally, I was in North Belfast earlier today. I started the day at the Girdwood hub where I again made the point that, if you take a map of the Troubles hotspots and overlap it with a contemporaneous map of health issues, particularly mental health and well-being, you have a match. The match is in places such as North Belfast, and I am committed and determined to do something about that.

Thank you, Minister, and thank you to everyone who participated in the debate.

Adjourned at 4.41 pm.