Mr. Stephen Mulvany:

Since the 2004-06 period, the HSE's patient private property working group and the guidance it has issued have substantially improved controls in this regard. There are many vulnerable elements and staff who are trying to deal with complex issues, patients and families. Fundamentally, this is a service for patients and their families. A system has been in place for years. An external firm is contracted every year separate from the HSE to audit all 150 or so centres. It physically attends a large sample and produces a financial statement. It gives us a list of control breaches. It also prepares the overall patient private property account which is audited by the Comptroller and Auditor General. Having gone through approximately 70% of the work on the control breaches, my sense is that there are strong controls in place. No system of control is perfect and cannot be improved, but this one is strong, given how dispersed it is. More than 90% of the money in question is not in local centres where it is more difficult to exercise control, rather it is in the central unit, the audits of which have never raised a significant issue. The system is relatively well managed, but we do not want to be complacent.