Ms Clare McGrath:

As there is less money available, to maximise the use of that money we are looking to get the optimum return. There is a tension in that and there is a balance that has to be struck. The Office of Government Procurement is looking at the issue. When it was with us in the National Procurement Service, NPS, we would have had many meetings with SMEs, IBEC, and industry representatives. We would have worked to have road-shows around the country with IntrerTradeIreland bringing public buyers together with the private sector to communicate to both sides what was involved in a procurement and the implications for SMEs. In fairness, with the e-tenders website there should be a minimisation of the paperwork that has to be done. The actual limits in terms of turnover are carefully scrutinised to assist SMEs to compete and to take procedural things out of the equation. That is very much in the equation at the moment.