Mr. Joe Hamill:

Essentially, our oversight role involves making sure the systems are in place and the money is properly spent, dealt with and accounted for. The first thing I would mention is that we have a formal service level agreement with each of our agencies. That sets down the targets for the year. It sets down what they have to do and we have to do in terms of how we draw the money down and how it is accounted for. That is underpinned by the quarterly review meetings that are held by each of our line sections with the relevant bodies.

Obviously, the code of governance for State bodies is kind of the bible in all of this. At the end of 2013, we initiated a formal review of the code with every one of the bodies. Arising from that, I have formally written to each of the directors and chairs setting out the outcome of that review with generic recommendations for each body and specific recommendations where specific matters arose. Every one of the bodies has shown a very good level of compliance with the code, but there were some gaps and issues of consistency, etc. We have put that in place. There is a report for each of the bodies. We have agreed with them that we will come back and review that later this year. I should also mention that this year, my internal audit unit has taken on the task of looking at our own internal processes, in terms of how our line divisions relate to the bodies, to ensure we have a consistency of approach as well. Clearly, there is a great deal of daily contact between the bodies and the line divisions that operate with them. That is the general position of where we are in a more formal sense.