Mr. Tony O'Brien:

I refer to the timing of the initial completion of internal audit's report, its submission to our audit committee and then to our management team and then on to our board in July. This was run in parallel with one of the key recommendations, which was the requirement for a clear restatement of public pay policy, which our colleagues in the two Departments provided to us in the latter end of September. In that context and with regard to the actions we have been taking since then, I am satisfied with progress. I of course would be happier were a greater number of these agencies in a position to satisfy us of their compliance. However given that the clear statement of policy against which we now are judging compliance was available to us at the end of September - I believe it issued on 30 September - the rate of progress since then has been reasonably good. We expect that more of these agencies will be in a position to assure us of compliance than have yet done so. Equally, however, I expect that we will be obliged to go the next step with a number of them as well.