Mr. Paul Reid:

Sometimes the point is made that the private sector has it right and public service needs to learn from the private sector. This is not always true and some decisions the private sector can make are not open to the public service. We are experiencing high demands for service and the private sector would deal with that by stopping demand. It is not a like-for-like comparison. Having said that, the point is well made and the skills and experience of the public service can be applied to the private sector. The recent proposals the Minister brought to Government allow us to place people in the private sector and vice versa. We are working with private sector bodies to try to move the process through. It is not always like-for-like but certain experiences complement one another. That has been my experience over the past year.