Senator Bob Carr: The Minister for Veterans' Affairs has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) (a) The impact of the 1.5% efficiency dividend for the 2012-13 Financial Year is $4.5 million. (b) The impact of the 2.5% efficiency dividend for the 2012-13 Financial Year is $7.3 million. (c) There were no other decisions of Government that resulted in other savings measures for the Department in 2012-13. (2) The Department has implemented the efficiency dividend targets without impact on any services to the veteran community. Areas of where savings were made include: reduction in ICT expenses; realigning functions in various areas of the Department, for example realigning the current appeals and support functions through the redefining of roles within VEA Appeals and Reviews; realignment of Department compliance activities, for example in the internal audit program; and reduction in the area of consultants, contractors and travel. (3) For the 2011-12 Financial Year, out of a total expenditure of approximately $360 million, DVA spent approximately $192 million on staffing costs, equating to 54%. (4) As a result of the efficiency dividend for 2012-13 a net reduction is expected of: (a) approximately $6.07 million savings from 67 staff reduction (which equates to approximately 62 FTE); and (b) approximately $3.6 million savings due to reduced expenditure on contracts and consultants. (5) As a result of the efficiency dividend: 46 staff received voluntary redundancies; and 0 staff received involuntary redundancies. (6) The current distribution of full-time equivalent staff across classification bands is provided below: Current Distribution of FTE across classifications Classification band FTE APS1 14.0 APS2 68.2 APS3 294.5 APS4 212.2 APS5 417.5 APS6 417.4 Advocate 8.0 EL1 306.1 EL2 123.7 Grad 15.0 Legal 1 8.8 Legal 2 3.0 Medical Officers 2.6 SES 29.0 Statutory 5.0 Total 1925.0 Figures as at 30 September 2012.