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We will now move on to questions from Emma Harper.

We are coming up against the deadline for this panel of witnesses because we have a second panel, but I will bring in Dr Gulhane.

Were you directing those comments to anyone in particular or should I just go round everyone?

Thank you, that is very helpful. Before we move on to talk about staffing more generally, Emma Harper has a quick supplementary question.

I have a shout out for the broadcasting staff. Professor Smith’s feed is quite jumpy. If we take off her video, would the sound, which is the most important part, improve? We were able to hear some of what she said, but the sound was quite jumpy. We will try to get that sorted out.

That was helpful in enabling us to start to think about where our focus might lie. One theme that we want to ask you about is to do with life expectancy and the factors that are involved in that. Some of you have been involved in producing important reports on the subject. It is a hugely complex area, on which all of us have read many reports.

My colleagues have a number of questions on life expectancy. We will start with Evelyn Tweed.

Thank you. It has been really helpful to hear from all of you on the general priorities. My colleague Paul O’Kane will direct his first question to a particular witness, but anyone else who wants to comment should put the letter R in the chat function.

We will just wait for broadcasting to unmute Colin Poolman.

You only got about a sentence in, so you can start from the beginning.

A number of members want to dig deeper into the staffing issues that all the witnesses have raised. I go first to David Torrance.