Mr. Fintan Hourihan:

No, and that is something that we have specifically asked would happen. We met the Dental Council recently and we asked that it would assist in gathering information on how many dentists are in active practice. That is going to require a direction from the Department of Health. It was recommended about ten years ago in research commissioned by the Department of Health that there be a database. I cannot say what numbers are in practice, how many are in full-time or part-time practice or the hours they work. We suspect there are large numbers of dentists who are not working the traditional five-day or six-day working week, as would have been the case, and there are dentists who are specialising in different areas of practice. Without the data, it is very hard to plan.