To date, I've already awarded £89 million to support 14 proposals, with at least one in each region. Transformation projects are visible across Wales. For example, technology-enabled care in west Wales is bringing communities together and reducing social isolation. In Gwent, services are being reconfigured to provide specialist expertise to staff on the front line in order to support some of our most vulnerable children. Community Connectors in the most rural parts of Wales are helping people to access local well-being services. Over 1,000 expressions of interest have been received for the I CAN mental health support training that is now being rolled out across north Wales. I'm grateful to all of our regional partners for their enthusiasm and the tireless work of their regional teams in turning their ambitions into reality. 

As all of us know, health and social care is a complex system that is continually under pressure. Quickly translating policy into tangible change on the ground is a real challenge, and that is, after all, partly why four parties from this Assembly agreed to commission the parliamentary review in the first place, and we're now implementing the recommendations from the review. Of course, I set out the Government's approach and vision in 'A Healthier Wales', but we must continue to engage closely with our delivery partners and to evaluate the impact of what we do.

So, we have completed two rounds of quarterly reviews, with the third round imminent. Fourteen workplace engagement events highlighting local transformation projects have taken place across Wales, organised and run as a partnership by the Welsh Government and regional partnership boards.

I've listened to feedback from regional partners who told me that initial progress was slower than they had expected, largely due to recruitment and procurement issues. In response, I have extended the funding period in support of new models from December 2020 to March 2021. I've always been clear, though, that the transformation fund is intended as a catalyst and will be non-recurrent. Regional partners need to identify resources from their recurrent budgets to support the scaling up of transformation, including further transformative priorities. 

I also promised to look closely at options for the fund, including how to allocate the remaining £11 million. Given the delays in the budget process by the UK Government, we, of course, face a very challenging situation, and I also recognise the need and the reality that limited funding for the health and social care system has to support the whole system.

I'm grateful for the work and commitment of partners in developing their second-round proposals for the fund. In taking into account learning from the first round of proposals, I've made a decision, and I've written to regional partnership boards to set out the indicative allocation of the remaining transformation fund budget. This will be delivered on a regional basis in line with the NHS funding formula for health boards together with a call for new proposals that build on existing projects. That should enable regions to frame the scale and scope of their proposals in terms of an approximate funding envelope, to help focus time and regional effort. Confirmation of funding will be subject to regional partnership boards submitting viable proposals. I'll be looking for submissions that enhance and supplement approved proposals, with an emphasis on scaling out from single-region to multi-region working and to national scope.

A template and supplementary guidance will be provided and bids will be assessed by the appraisal panel within a set time frame. The core criteria for the fund will remain as in the published guidance, with that emphasis on multi-regional working and national scale. 

I expect regional partnership boards to provide proposals by the middle of March 2020, so within the next few months, and I will then promptly confirm decisions to regional partnership boards thereafter. The transformation fund team are available, of course, to support regions as they develop their bids. 

This, I believe, is a flexible and pragmatic approach that recognises the current position of our budgets, the urgent need to offer clarity to regional partners, the challenges in the delivery of approved proposals, and learning from the implementation to date, which has highlighted the need for further support to enhance the existing transformative progress. I look forward to answering questions from Members today.