Mr. Kevin Duffy:

What we have said in the report, and again this is an important point, is that pay in and of itself is not the only issue. We did not say that it was not an issue, but that in and of itself it is not the only issue. Again, that has been misinterpreted by people who have commented on our report. We did make some recommendations on pay and we stated, as I told Deputy O'Reilly, that there is sense of grievance among nurses about their pay levels vis-à-visthat of others, but it is not confined to nurses, and the members of the commission said that this needs to be looked at as a separate exercise.

I take the Deputy's point. We are working towards a holistic approach, but we had to work within the parameters of our terms of reference, and we could not go beyond those.

There are many issues, and I have no doubt that, in the fullness of time, they will be dealt with. We have made the recommendations that we felt we could make and were justified in the report.