Official Report: Minutes of Evidence

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): Attending the meeting from the Department are Richard Logan, finance director; Andrea Quail, head of financial strategy; and Louise Blair, head of financial planning. You are all very welcome. It is good to have you with us again. Thank you for the papers that you sent through. The plan, as usual, is to hand over to you for opening remarks — anything that you want to add to the report that you sent in — and then open the floor to questions from Committee members. Is that OK?

Mr Richard Logan (Department of Justice): Yes, thank you. Good afternoon, folks. Thank you for the opportunity to update the Committee on finance-related matters in the Department, including the June monitoring round. We have provided the Committee with a detailed written briefing on the areas that we will cover. I therefore intend to provide just a brief overview to highlight some key points.

First, I will consider the Department's provisional out-turn for 2024-25. A £3 million underspend in the non-ring-fenced resource departmental expenditure limit (DEL) was offset by an overspend of £1·2 million in the ring-fenced resource DEL for depreciation. The Department's total resource DEL position therefore showed an underspend of £1·8 million, which, given a budget of more than £1·4 billion, means that we essentially spent 99·9% of the money that was available. That provisional out-turn position will be revised to reflect the Department's final out-turn once the 2024-25 accounts have been audited. I do not expect there to be any significant change to the figures that I just mentioned.

The Department submitted its draft annual report and accounts to the Northern Ireland Audit Office (NIAO) for the 2024-25 statutory accounts on 30 May, in line with the agreed timetable. We are on course to meet the deadline of summer recess — 4 July — for the accounts to be laid in the Assembly. That will be a significant achievement in that the Department will have fulfilled its statutory reporting duties, ensuring compliance with governance and accountability responsibilities.

I will turn to the budget for the 2025-26 financial year. Following agreement by the Executive, the Finance Minister issued Budget allocations to Departments on 3 April. The Department of Justice was provided with a non-ring-fenced resource DEL budget of £1·415 billion, a ring-fenced resource DEL budget of £87·87 million and a capital DEL budget of £100 million. The Department issued final opening budget allocations to all its business areas on 8 April.

At our most recent evidence session with the Committee, which was in February, we outlined the fact that the Department would be starting the financial year with stabilisation pressures of approximately £60 million. Table 2 in our written briefing contains reconciliation data that shows the movements from the opening position of £60 million of pressures to a revised opening position of £44 million. The reduction of £16 million was due to a combination of opening Budget allocations for NI Civil Service (NICS) pay awards and indicative June monitoring allocations for employers' National Insurance contributions (NIC) and the Programme for Government (PFG) priority on safer communities.

That reduction was also due to the confirmation of funding for the protocol and Windsor framework and the reporting of revised pressures by business areas. However, despite the welcomed additional allocations improving our opening position, the budget remains difficult for the Department to manage. It will present challenges across all DOJ business areas, including policing, legal aid and prisons, in delivering Programme for Government and departmental priorities. The budget will require careful management and difficult decisions to reduce the risk of an overspend. All DOJ business areas will be required to implement cost reductions and efficiencies to reduce the level of remaining pressures.

Regarding the latest in-year position, the Department submitted its June monitoring return to the Department of Finance on 5 June. All business areas across the Department undertook a full review of their financial position, which resulted in a revised level of £32 million in pressures being reported. That is a £12 million reduction in the opening figures for pressures of £44 million and reflects continued strong and effective financial management across DOJ. The Department therefore submitted bids to DOF as part of the June monitoring round to the value of £31·7 million for stabilisation pressures. That includes a bid of £21 million for PSNI pressures in relation to the workforce recovery plan, increased employers' NIC costs, ill-health retirement costs and legacy inquest costs. There is a £10 million bid for legal aid, which represents the shortfall between the opening budget allocation and the amount that is estimated will be needed to ensure that bills are paid within a reasonable time frame, in line with the judgement in the recent judicial review. There is also a £1 million bid for the Prison Service, relating to pressures arising from the increasing prisoner population. In addition, the Department submitted an initial £5 million bid last night to the Department of Finance in respect of costs that have been incurred by the PSNI as a result of the recent disorder. That is an estimated amount, as the detailed costs have not yet been finalised. The Department also continues to highlight to the Department of Finance the exceptional pressures from legal claims related to the PSNI data breach, holiday pay and the McCloud remedy. Those pressures remain unaffordable for the Department given their magnitude and the Department's Budget allocation.

The Chancellor's autumn Budget and spending review statements effectively reset the funding envelopes for Whitehall Departments. That means that Northern Ireland Departments cannot expect the same level of additional funding to be provided during 2025-26 as was provided in 2024-25. Furthermore, given the significant pressures that remain across the block, it is likely that there will be very limited, if any, funding available for allocation during 2025-26. The outcome of June monitoring should be known in the next couple of weeks, and we will keep the Committee updated accordingly. While we await that outcome, business areas have been advised that they must manage their spending plans in line with their opening budget allocation letters, which include indicative allocations from June monitoring for employers' NIC costs and PFG commitments.

The Committee will already be aware that the Department was successful in securing transformation funding of £22·6 million for two projects — speeding up justice and modernising electronic monitoring — in the first tranche of bids. The Department received £5·4 million in its 2025-26 budget allocation for those projects, and work on both is progressing. The Finance Minister noted that there will be a second tranche of applications to the public-sector transformation board. It is expected that that work will be commissioned in the near future. Departmental officials stand ready to consider and develop further proposals for that next call. It is expected that the work will be carried out at pace to ensure that Departments with successful proposals can access the funding as soon as possible in 2025-26.

The Executive's Budget sustainability plan, which was published on 3 October 2024, included this key commitment:

The plan says:

The plans will set out the strategic direction for each Department and bring together all the key elements that will impact on resource and capital budgets over the next five years. The focus will be on what we do, why we do it, whether it should continue and whether it is affordable. Although it will be the first iteration of our departmental plan, we expect that it will be further developed and updated annually. The Department has already commissioned that new additional work from all DOJ business areas. It is envisaged that it will be completed in conjunction with the future years' budget exercise, which, following the Chancellor's spending review statement yesterday, is likely to be commissioned shortly by DOF.

I trust that we have provided you with a helpful overview of our financial position. We continue to operate in an uncertain financial environment, and the Department's position remains extremely challenging in respect of managing the budget. Thank you for the opportunity to brief you today. We very much value the role and views of the Committee, and we are happy to take your questions.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): Thank you very much, Richard. Does anybody have any questions?

Miss Hargey: Thanks very much for the update. On the back of the comprehensive spending review announcement yesterday, have you seen anything on Justice costs coming out?

Mr Logan: We will need to wait for the Executive to have the opportunity to look at the implications of the spending review. That work on costs will then be commissioned through the future years' budget exercise, but it is too early to say what the implications for Justice will be.

Miss Hargey: There are no early indications at this point.

Mr Logan: We will be in a position to assess that when we know what the Budget allocations from the Executive will be.

Miss Hargey: With regard to the huge costs of the McCloud judgement and the PSNI data breach, are discussions ongoing with DOF? Are there any ongoing discussions with Treasury on how some of those costs can be managed?

Mr Logan: We are in regular contact with DOF and are keeping it updated. There has not been significant change in the costs that were quoted. Those cases are progressing. They could go up a wee bit or down, so we are not changing our figure until we know the definitive position. I understand that the Finance Minister and DOF colleagues are still engaging with Treasury on that, but now that we have the comprehensive spending review and the Executive have the Budget, that will be part of their consideration of how to fund those costs.

Miss Hargey: Do we have a timescale yet for when those cases will run their course? Do you anticipate that it will be this year, or will it be the next financial year?

Mr Logan: We sat here last year saying that it could be 2024-25. We are in a similar position now. The individual cases are progressing through either mediation or case management hearings in court, but they are not at the stage of coming to a conclusion.

Miss Hargey: Do you have a timescale?

Mr Logan: We do not have a definitive one.

Miss Hargey: OK, no worries. You have given an update on transformation projects, but there is still around £100 million left in the pot. Are you going to resubmit some of the bids that were not met the last time or submit new bids?

Mr Logan: We are not at that point. We will wait to see what the call is, and we will be told how many bids the Departments can submit. It was split last time between smaller bids and larger bids. We are not sure yet what the criteria will be. We have alerted our business areas to say that a call will be coming, and we will see what the initial feedback is. The Department and the Minister can then make a call on what bids will have the greatest chance of success.

Miss Hargey: My last question is about pressures in policing, which is timely given the events of this week. Will you give us an update on the business case? I know that it is between the Department and DOF, but, on the back of recent events, which were similar to those that were experienced last year, has there been any engagement with the Minister on getting additional resources for policing via the NIO?

Mr Logan: I am not sure about the NIO. In the first instance, the engagement would be between our Minister and the Finance Minister, and then we would see where that takes us. There are two elements to the pressures this year for the police: the £21 million includes £7 million for the workforce. In the Budget framework and the options for us, the first route will be June monitoring to see whether any money can be obtained there, but we are conscious that that is just an in-year solution. We have needed the comprehensive spending review to set the Budgets for the next three years to give the Executive certainty. That will hopefully provide an opportunity to secure the funding.

Ms Egan: My question is not dissimilar to Deirdre's. Yesterday, the police announced that they are requesting extra officers from Scotland to deal with the pressures of the past few days. Has the Department been in contact with the PSNI about that? What funding will be provided there?

Mr Logan: I contacted my counterparts in the PSNI finance team yesterday to get an update on the costs. They are still collating and working through the information. I then spoke with DOF's Supply division. Following those conversations and discussions with the Minister, we submitted the bid last night. The £5 million bid is us putting a marker down to say that we know that there will be costs but, at this stage, we do not know what they will be. The PSNI will collate a figure, but its final quantum will depend on how long the disorder lasts.

The total cost to the PSNI last year was in the region of £3·5 million, and £2·75 million of funding was provided to offset some of its costs. That is the baseline, given previous experience, for the type of costs that will potentially be incurred.

Mr Beattie: Thank you for that briefing, Richard. The Chief Constable had a business case for £200 million for police stabilisation over three years. I do not believe — put me right, if I am wrong — that that was ever agreed. The Chief Constable continues to spend on recruitment because he has to, which means that he is spending money that he does not have. How will we get that across the line for this year and for coming years?

Mr Logan: The police started the year with 6,358 officers. That was the number that was in the business case. I believe that, as of 1 June, the number of officers was 6,198, so there has been a reduction. Recruitment will be needed to replace officers who leave. There is ongoing replacement, averaging, I think, 30 officers per month. When those officers leave, their costs are replaced by the cost of the recruitment exercise. When the Chief Constable reaches a point at which he has gone above and beyond what he originally had the budget for, he will be spending money that he does not have. In the meantime, we are trying to secure the additional funding from the Minister.

As I mentioned, up until this point, we had only a 2025-26 budget to manage, and the Executive had funding for only one year. The spending review has given the Executive certainty for the next three years. The discussions and the future years' budget exercise, which will be for three years for the resource budget and four years for the capital budget, will give us an opportunity to bid again and have those conversations with the Executive.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): In addition to that, Doug, during the Budget debate in the Chamber on Monday, the Finance Minister indicated that, as far as he was concerned, the business case had been made for the Chief Constable to recruit an additional 300 officers. He felt that the business case was fine.

Mr Logan: The business case allows for an increase of 640 officers, which would take the number up to 7,000, with 240 additional police staff support. The value-for-money element and all the technicalities of the business case have been approved. The outstanding and most important issue is affordability. Now that we have three-year budgets, we have the foundation on which we can have the conversation to see whether we can secure the money.

Mr Beattie: That says to me that the business case has been agreed and that we all agree that this needs to happen, but there is no money to do it. If the Finance Minister were to turn around and say, "Do you know what, Justice Department? I am going to ring-fence £200 million of your budget, and you will use it purely for police recruitment", what would be the effect?

Mr Logan: If the money that is being ring-fenced is existing money, we will be reporting £220 million of pressures instead of £21 million in June monitoring. Unless the money is additional, over and above our the money that we need to manage our baseline costs, it will not assist us. Unless we get money over and above that that we need to manage our baseline costs, ring-fencing a certain amount of Justice's Budget allocation will just move the pressure from the police recovery business case to day-to-day operational pressures. We need the total pot to increase rather than have a specific amount ring-fenced.

Mr Beattie: That is what happened with Health. The Health Department had an amount that was ring-fenced for hospital waiting lists and had to find that money by making savings elsewhere in its budget. In other words, it had to prioritise waiting lists. Are you saying that it would be the same for you — that you would have to prioritise police recruitment and that other parts of the Department would have to give up moneys? Is that what you are saying?

Mr Logan: In theory, yes. In practice, however, I do not think that the Department could take that position forward, because 64% of our £1·4 billion budget is for police. Then, prisons and legal services take us up to 85% of the budget, and, when we add in courts, we are up to 90% of the budget. There are clearly pressures in prisons, legal services and courts. We cannot divert existing budgets from those areas to fund the police, because the quantum is much smaller. Some of our organisations have budgets of £1 million or £2 million. For Criminal Justice Inspection (CJINI), a cut of £50,000 is a 10% cut in its staffing levels. On paper, it might be suggested that we could reduce our spend elsewhere, but we cannot take that position if we are going to keep a justice system running.

Mr Beattie: I kind of accept that and agree with you: the Justice Department needs more money, without a shadow of a doubt. However, if you have to prioritise, the call now is that the police, somewhere along the line, will have to be your priority — your main effort, if we can call it that. You are saying that with the budget envelope that you have at the minute, you cannot even do that.

Mr Logan: Of our total spend of £1·4 billion, 70% to 75% is committed in staff costs. We cannot reduce those costs at the moment. We cannot afford the increase that is needed for the police element of those costs. The £206 million over five years increases gradually, so it is £7 million in the first year and then £20 million, £35 million, £40 million, and, by the end of 2029-2030, £64 million per annum. That is the figure in the business case. That would be the extra ask each year, so the £209 million would not be a hit in one year: it would be spread. However, on prioritising, last November, the Department got £37 million or £38 million from the Executive in a monitoring round, and we were able to increase that to £46 million through other easements in the Department. The Minister prioritised policing, which got 80% of the funding at that time. Similarly, in this year's June monitoring, we have £5 million for Programme for Government priorities and £4·7 million for employers' National Insurance contributions. The police's share of those figures is just under 80%, so the Minister is taking every opportunity to prioritise policing whilst being mindful of the pressures elsewhere. It is about treading a fine line to make sure that the whole system continues to operate rather than one particular area.

Mr Beattie: That is a fair one. I want to be direct and really honest with you, Richard. That is why I asked those questions. Unless there is a substantial influx of resource in the Department of Justice, the police will not be able to meet the levels that they want to meet, not even the interim levels at this rate, because there is simply no resource to redirect to them. That is a fair argument, is it not?

Mr Logan: Absolutely. We have very little, if any, discretionary spend. The spend is either on staff or is committed through IT costs and accommodation costs. We do not issue a huge number of grants: we only give out about £10 million in grants and even those are not necessarily discretionary, because the organisations that receive them provide services across and in support of the justice sector. The Department's scope for reducing spend is minimal.

Mr Beattie: One last one: is there any way, Richard, that we can kick in the doors of the NIO and say, "Look, we are unique. We need more funding here", or go back to the Treasury and say, "We need you to send funding directly to the Department of Justice, as opposed to it going to the Executive and being captured by other Departments"?

Mr Logan: The Department of Justice's route is through DOF and the Executive. That is the devolved arrangement: we cannot go directly to NIO. All discussions with Treasury are done through Department of Finance officials. Justice officials do not have direct contact with Treasury officials. We are hopeful, and we know that the Finance Minister and DOF officials are having those discussions in the background.

Mr Beattie: Fair enough. Thank you.

Ms Ferguson: Thank you, Richard, for the update so far. I want to move from revenue funding to the capital funding. There is an allocation of £100 million of capital funding, which is £35 million less than the value of the capital bids that was submitted for the year. The Department indicated that, as a result, not all the high-priority projects could be met. The Department has stated that the capital pressure stands at £1 million and that it will not make any capital bids in the monitoring round. I can understand that given the availability of funding in the monitoring round. Will any of the work that was considered to be a high priority but was not funded by your initial budget allocation be taken forward in this financial year? If so, how will that happen in the absence of any additional funds through the monitoring rounds?

Mr Logan: The £100 million will fund whatever can be afforded from that. We will shift the high-priority projects that cannot be taken forward this year into future years as pressures. Last year, for the future years' budget exercise, we did a 10-year outlook on the capital spend. In the past number of years, we have been running spend of £80 million to £100 million in capital.

In a couple of years' time, we expect the demand to be about £200 million to £300 million because there are large projects, such as Themis, in the courts, the new accommodation in forensics, police developments and prisons options. We are going to see much more pressing demand for capital in future years. At the moment, for the £100 million, you are quite right, we did not make a bid. It has to be more than £1 million to bid for it, and no pressures or bids were reported by the business areas. Therefore, we think that this year will be OK, but it will push the spend into future years.

Ms Ferguson: In pushing it into future years, is there anything that was key to delivery last year that is now being pushed back a further year? Are there any specific projects? I think, particularly in my constituency, the courthouses were number 2. I am just looking at the push back. Are there any specific projects that have been pushed back that were on the agenda to move forward in this financial year?

Mr Logan: Of the big capital projects, nothing has been stopped or deferred deliberately or on purpose. The natural course of procurement and things like that generally takes longer than we might expect at the start. As far as I am aware, nothing has been stopped because of budgetary restrictions; it is more just the timing of the projects to get the work done.

Ms Ferguson: Thank you. I have just one other question here, in relation to employers' NIC for the community and voluntary groups. The Department previously advised us that it could not provide an estimate of the cost. I wonder what further engagement has taken place with the community and voluntary sector groups and what impact it may have, or has a solution been found to support that cost?

Mr Logan: We previously reported that we had pressures in employers' NIC in the region of £14 million as a Department. We got an allocation of £4·7 million for that, so we were £9 million or £10 million short, and that has been allocated to the business areas on a pro rata basis. Our advice to the business areas is to deal with the voluntary and community sector organisations on a case-by-case basis. We do not have oversight of the organisations' full costs. Individuals get projects, and costs come our way, so our advice to our business areas is to have those discussions on a local and individual basis, rather than collectively. We were not in a position to meet all the costs for the DOJ business areas, and that was the advice that we gave to our business areas: have individual discussions with the voluntary and community sector organisations.

Ms Ferguson: Thank you, Richard.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): Anybody else? No? I have a few questions, if that is all right. I will work our way through the report with you. I take you to paragraph 9. There is an underspend of £478·2 million. You provided something of an explanation, but that seems like quite a significant underspend. Can you explain how that process works and whether that level of underspend is likely to have an impact on future allocations to the Department?

Mr Logan: I do not expect it to. The annually managed expenditure (AME) spend is an area where there is considerable uncertainty. It is not our DEL budget, so it is not cash. These are big areas. Of that underspend, £200 million or so related to the police, and part of it was related to police pensions. Police pensions are valued at £7 billion or £8 billion. Each year, we get a valuation from the Government Actuary's Department, where it makes assumptions. A very small change in assumption has a significant effect, so it is very little. We generally tend to build in headroom for AME. We are more prudent on AME, because there is more uncertainty. We do not know whether something will change. In the 2023-24 accounts, the police had an unexpected AME charge of up to £150 million to £200 million that had not been forecast, but we had headroom in other areas, which meant that we were able to offset it and we did not overspend. Therefore, there is an element of trying to be very prudent on it, since we are dealing with areas of great uncertainty. However, it will not affect or impact on the DEL budget: that is the key one. It is not money that we are just spending. It is paper amounts. We want to be as accurate as possible. We have the credibility issue with DOF that we want to be accurate with our forecasts, but those are the areas where we have the greatest uncertainty.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): That is helpful. Thank you very much, Richard. I am working my way through. I will take paragraph 18 with paragraph 20. You indicate:

Paragraph 20 talks about:

Can you give some indication of what is under consideration? How are you going to determine it?

Mr Logan: Looking back at the situation 12 months ago, we went into the monitoring rounds with in excess of £100 million in pressures. We had successful monitoring rounds, where we achieved £35 million and £38 million. The gap was much larger, and the scale of the decisions a year ago was much bigger. This year, we got a better outcome at the start, and we are now down to £32 million of net pressures. There is £7 million for workforce recovery and £10 million for legal aid. We are waiting to see whether those costs come through. The quantum of what we are looking at is not insignificant, but the amount is 1·5% to 2% of the total budget. Therefore, we are not looking at any major changes anywhere. It will be small changes, such as continued vacancy management and maybe deferring some work. There is no one big element.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): It is marginal gains.

Mr Logan: It is marginal, and that is not to make light of it. We have a significant gap in policing to sort out, but we are on the margins compared with where we were a year ago. The final bit is just the remaining challenge. It is small bits across every area.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): Thank you. That is helpful. The report mentions a reserve claim from Treasury. Forgive me, but this is the first Committee that I have chaired. How does a reserve claim from Treasury work?

Mr Logan: A claim is submitted through DOF, and it is usually for exceptional or unexpected costs. When the data breach happened in August 2023, the initial talk was about the immediate costs to deal with the situation. There was talk at that stage of a reserve claim to meet those costs. A claim goes to the Treasury, and it decides whether the money will be released, and it is also at its discretion whether the amounts are repayable. There could be a reserve claim that does not have to be repaid, or it may be repaid over a number of years. The terms are at the discretion of the Treasury. However, the Labour Government said that the reserve claim was practically exhausted in June of last year. The Chancellor has laid out the financial challenges, and it is fully at the discretion of the Treasury as to whether the claim is released.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): OK. I have just a couple more. Protocol funding is mentioned at paragraph 27. What is that for?

Mr Logan: There are specific elements of police funding that falls within the legislation and definition of the framework. The police can bid for and get funding for certain types of work. I do not have the exact details of what that is, but we can share that with you. The framework and legislation around the protocol allow for certain types of work to be funded, and the police can bid for that. The bids in the previous years were higher, but they did not get approved because the Treasury said that they did not meet the criteria. The level of £4 million has been typical of the successful bids that the police have made over the past number of years.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): OK. At paragraph 26, DOF indicated:

Does that leave you in any difficulties?

Mr Logan: As a Department, we think that it is too long until the January monitoring round, and we get monthly updates and are in constant contact with our business areas. Our current plan is to run an internal exercise along similar timescales to October monitoring so that we are in the position of having the most up-to-date information. If DOF then decides to do an urgent exercise —

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): You are ready.

Mr Logan: — we are ready for that. Something similar happened last year when the exercise was shorter than the timescale that we had asked from our business areas. That was just over the summer months, but that is our plan. It is about trying to balance it out; we have gone out to our business areas on the departmental plan, and that is a significant bit of work for them. We have already seen the benefits and the discussions around the Department, because people are having to look across five years and not just tell us what their pressures are. We have gone down a route of getting details of staff costs, overheads, things that are going to change, changes in policies that people would like to do and what income generation or transformation opportunities there are. We have that exercise out at the moment, and DOF will shortly commission a future years' budget exercise, and they will both have September timescales for concluding. We then need to, at some point, commission in-year monitoring, which might be in September. It is about trying to balance the work out with the organisations so that it is not hitting them all at once.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): That is great, thank you. Paragraph 29 states:

It is not very much money, but what is that for?

Mr Logan: One in particular is £2·2 million for the police for security at the Open. That has been agreed with Economy, and that funding will come in. There are other things, such as funding for the Rowan sexual assault referral centre. They are transactions where the budget sits with a DOJ organisation or vice versa, and then the Departments agree in-year what is going to be transferred. Funding for the Open for the police is probably the main one within that.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): OK, that is fair enough. The Deputy Chairperson raised the issue of transformation. I as sure that, in papers that we received a few weeks ago, there was something that indicated that a bid was being reworked — one of the failed bids. Work was being done on that to see whether it could be reworked and taken forward again. Is that in the pipeline?

Mr Logan: That was maybe referring to the reducing offending bid. There was bail support work within that, coming from the Prison Service in conjunction with the Probation Board. I think that consideration is being given to that but, again, until we see the criteria —.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): You are not going to know.

Mr Logan: In the meantime, Prison Service is taking that forward. Although we did not get transformation money for that, the Prison Service has been able to take forward some work on a bail support pilot, and the Probation Board has done similar with enhanced combination orders. Although we were not successful in the original bid, we have tried to put a small amount of money in. From discussions with DOF, we know that finances are going to be limited over the next number of years, so, as a Department, we have to take responsibility in business areas to see what we can do for ourselves, and that is about looking at those pilots or areas that we can see will help to improve the justice system but also, from my perspective, the affordability and the cost. If we generate savings or at least cap costs going forward, that will be particularly helpful.

The Chairperson (Ms Bunting): That is really helpful, Richard. Thank you very much. Does anyone else have anything further? No? In that case, folks, thank you very much. It has been great to have you with us, and thank you for taking the time to answer our questions. We appreciate it, and we will see you all in due course.