Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

I thank Senator Fitzgerald for his kind comments. He and I soldiered together in the VEC and DIT, starting exactly 20 years ago this month. Coming from the perspective of the Department of Education and Science, we probably treated the chief executive of the agency as a teacher who could be seconded while a member of the Oireachtas. While that does not apply generally across the Civil Service it is possible for academic staff and teachers to be seconded. That must have been the frame of mind informing this provision although I do not know exactly how it came about.