Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The delegation is more than welcome. I am familiar with the committee's oversight role. My understanding is Portugal and Austria are the two partners that will review Ireland's overseas development aid programme and Malawi is being taken as the counter country. How were Austria and Portugal chosen? What is the relationship between these countries? Are OECD staff in those countries? What is the relationship within them vis-á-visthe other team that will accompany these staff for two weeks in Malawi? I would like to clarify this organisational question.
Reference was made to the importance of this committee. We sanction the ODA budget and, unfortunately, we also cut it on occasions. It has reduced from 0.7% of GDP to less than 0.5%. However, there are historical and economic reasons for that.
Has the OECD a vision of how to best use development aid? We pride ourselves in Ireland on being a small country doing a good job but we do not have oversight of projects that are being funded, which we think are great. When Ireland and its work in Malawi is compared to that of other OECD members, how are conclusions drawn in the context of the organisation's vision about the success or failure of our programme?
Uganda is a great example of where the Government stepped in quickly when it discovered fraud by the prime minister's office amounting to €3 million. We also pride ourselves that the fraud was exposed by virtue of the fact that Irish Aid had been assisting a department within the office. That is a great example of how aid is effective because ultimately €9 million was saved with two other affected donor countries also providing €3 million each. Aside from the traditional provision of aid for natural disasters, hunger and so on, has the OECD a vision as to how aid should best be distributed or implemented? Rather than feeding the hungry at the side of the road as part of a charitable, aid assisted programme of the government, investment should be made in infrastructure. If there is massive corruption in countries, ODA will dissipate. Should the corruption not be tackled? Should governments be assisted at local and national level where they are weak? Many of these countries are emerging from wars or other friction. If hunger is the perennial problem, should aid be provided for food production methods, education and water treatment to reduce the need for aid for those who repeatedly fall sick from dysentery and so on?
The UN is preparing its post-2015 vision for development aid. Has the OECD a vision and does the organisation want us to conform to that?