Mr. Andy Pike:

I thank the Deputy. We have received no invitation to talks from the Department of education at all. We have told it we are available. We would not see the Department of public expenditure in any talks. What it does is ring up at the last minute and tell everybody if the deal can be done or not. You do not get to meet the Department face to face most of the time.

On floodgates and setting a precedent, I cannot think of another situation where there is a single employer - a school is a single employer with a board of management - with different terms and conditions for one category of staff over another in respect of pensions. That does not happen anywhere else. It is a unique employment situation. Any large employer has to apply the same pension terms to all employees. They do not apply different terms to one group than to another, so this situation is somewhat unique. Resolving it would not set a precedent and would not open the floodgates to thousands more people coming into the scheme.