Mr. Seán Ó Foghlú:

No. If a school had access to its own resources it would be allowed to do that. Because of the complexities in the teaching grades, increments and so on, as well as the Protection of Employees (Part-Time Work) Act 2001 and the Protection of Employees (Fixed-Term Work) Act 2003, we needed to centralise the arrangements because it would have been too big an administrative burden on schools. It would have been hard for us to manage centrally and know where teachers were in terms of income, skills, entitlements etc. The on-line claims system allows all that to take place.