Mr. Stephen Mulvany:

It was through a combination of revised rosters, reviews of staffing arrangements and targeted recruitment. Again, we can provide the specific details if it is of assistance.

Obviously, we must be clear and focused on reducing administration costs to the absolute minimum essential. However, I caution against any simplistic assumptions that administration costs are in some way bad. We have significant challenges on the clinical side whereby we expect clinicians to carry out administrative duties. In some cases there is a need for targeted investment in administration. We may not have been especially good over the years in separating what is called administration from what people might understand as administration. Our administrative management costs include costs which other agencies would call professional and technical costs. We also include costs which relate very much to front-line administration staff. Let us suppose a person is on a mental health community team. The team secretary does all the reception work, answers the telephone to the public and ensures the staff get connected to the consultant, if necessary. That is an essential part of providing a mental health service in the community. The analogy applies to all our services and yet that is what is called administration. When most members of the public think of administration they think of back-office administration. For example, in the case of the primary care reimbursement service we can show that the cost of administering the entire system is approximately 1.2% of the budget it dispenses. Administration is an essential part of providing a health service.