Mr. Tony O'Brien:

On the generic pricing issue, the legislation referred to would not have been before the House when Mr. McGee appeared before the committee. On the issue of agency staff, there is effectively a market price for agency staff, which includes the effect of recent directives which changed that pricing. Our objective at all times is to minimise the reliance on agency staff. As is known, in the course of the year there was a significant departure of staff from the HSE in light of the grace period scheme, which increased the reliance on agency staff at that time. There is not a set formula as such. We are working towards a minimisation. A number of measures, which have been in the public domain recently, are directed at this.