Mr. David Cooney:

As regards the Administration, Deputy Deasy focused on the national audit office and had some discussions on this point. One fact that emerged is that the number of auditors available to the office dropped from 130 to 100 over the past year. Much work has been done with the national audit office and it is being taken in hand by the Germans and Scandinavians. Sweden, Norway and Denmark are all working with the office. We do not do that because we would be duplicating the work of others. Work has gone on there and between 2006 and 2010, there was a 51% increase in staff numbers. They recently increased the number of judges from three to six so that they can carry out more work. They are responding to the fall-off in numbers. They are introducing legislation in Parliament for performance-based promotions that will allow salary increases for those working in audit offices. In developing countries, one of the major problems is training people in the public service and then they go to work for the private sector.