Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I do not want to go around on circles either. However, this is a critical matter.

In my experience in both the health and education sectors, people have been treated differently because they moved from, for example, one education and training board or one hospital to another. I have always held the view that the employer ultimately was the Department of Education and Skills or the HSE. That has been upheld by some scope section officers but rejected by others. It has been upheld by some appeals officers but rejected by others.

The end user of a nurse's or a teacher's services is the HSE or the Department of Education and Skills because they operate under the guidelines and rules laid down by the Department. Is that what the Minister has said or I have misinterpreted it? One cannot have different rules in different organisations. One institute of technology might apply different rules from another when it comes to self-employment. Who is the end user in those particular cases? Is it the HSE or the Department of Education and Skills? Incidentally, if we look at the pension side of that service, they are all paid by the Paymaster General.