Mr. Pat Maher:

Between the three motorway maintenance contracts, the three regional contracts plus the ten public private partnerships, there is a set of contract requirements. There is a very clear specification in terms of performance. We provide all of the information to these through the ICENET weather information system. This information is available in terms of decision making. Operators are required to collaborate and consult with adjoining operators to ensure there is consistency and we do not have a situation, for example, where one operator goes out and treats and another operator goes out two hours later but there is a gap between what they do. This is a fairly basic principle. This level of co-ordination also exists between adjoining and abutting local authorities and motorway networks. There is a fairly well honed system in terms of ensuring a consistency of approach between all of the different operators.