Dr. Geraldine Smith:

I can answer part of that question on the P60s. It is to do with the validation process of the audit. As the committee will be aware, I circularised the agencies on 25 June last at the start of this audit and I provided back to the agencies the information that they had provided to HR. I asked the agencies if they could please review this information and confirm to me that it was correct or, if they would like to update it, to do so. I asked them to confirm that what they were providing me with was the totality of the information - the pay remuneration package. I also asked them about pensions, bonuses, travel allowances, board directors' fees, etc. I also ask them to confirm which elements of the information they were providing came from public and from private sources. That information came back. As Deputy Áine Collins mentioned, it is self-declaration. I reviewed that and analysed it.

One of the validation tests I did on that was to ask the agencies then to confirm to me what figures they had provided back to the Revenue in terms of the gross income for the individual persons. I did not want net figures or anything like that. It was the gross, what was chargeable to tax. That exercise took some time. Agencies came back with the information.

I did a reasonableness check on what they had originally provided and what they were saying they had returned. That indicated one or two issues for me where I was able to go back to the agencies to ask could they please explain because I did not understand why there is a differential, and they were able to explain. In one particular case, they came back and said they had under declared to me and provided me with a further private allowance. Overall it was a reasonableness check. That, essentially, represented what went through the payrolls of those agencies.

I also asked the agencies to confirm how many payrolls they were running, again, cognisant of the fact that the HIQA report on Tallaght had identified an external payroll, and they came back to indicate the number of payrolls. Practically all, except one agency, have one payroll. There is one agency which identified that it has three.