Mr. Shay Cody:

From the point of view of the public services committee we have not come to any conclusion. We are the central clearing house for the procedures on these matters. As a matter of day-to-day engagement and courtesy, the management side would have liaised with us as they were going through what has turned out to be a much more protracted exercise. We have not put our hands on any allowances and come to a judgment on them. That is a matter for the local union committees, where issues such as these are dealt with, be it in education, health or the Garda. Obviously we are in constant contact with them.

We take the view that in some cases the allowances are well founded and should continue not only for current beneficiaries but for new beneficiaries. In other cases, there may well be a situation - we have no immediate knowledge of them - where the Croke Park agreement buy-out formula might be more appropriate. We have not involved ourselves in that. As we have already stated, it is not something we want to get involved in because we would not have sufficient knowledge of the 88 allowances that are on the table.