Mr. Fergal Goodman:

It might be important to touch on that question. A substantial number of people have retired from the UK to Ireland. Approximately half a million UK pensioners reside in other EU countries, of whom approximately 130,000 reside in Ireland. A similar number reside in Spain, and others reside in Italy and France. We are a big feature in that regard and there are reciprocal arrangements in place for Irish pensioners in the UK. The agreement between us provides for provision of health care. In effect, a medical card is provided in Ireland without any assessment process of those UK pensioners on the basis that that is what they would be entitled to in the country where they paid their social security contributions and so on.

If there was an exiting process with no follow-on arrangements, we would have to subject those pensioners to a medical card assessment process. That would be an administrative process. We believe many of them would qualify for a medical card anyway but it is much more streamlined at the moment because there is no requirement. Once somebody is a UK pensioner, they get a medical card and there are no issues and no questions asked.