Mr. John Ging:

I wish to make a point about Irish politicians visiting. When I worked in Gaza I had the privilege to be visited by Deputy Enda Kenny, the now Taoiseach, the leader of Fianna Fáil, Deputy Micheál Martin, the leader of Sinn Féin, Deputy Gerry Adams, and the President, who came to Gaza prior to being elected to that position. I want to highlight we have had so many important visitors. I could list many others but I just want to give the committee some examples of people, who also came in other capacities. When Deputy Kenny came he was not the Taoiseach at the time, and when he became Taoiseach he had it in his understanding.

As Deputy Barrett knows from having gone to Somalia 25 years ago, it does not leave one. It is an impression that stays with one. I want to re-emphasise the importance of this.

There is much talk about aid integrity, accountability and so forth, and rightly so. However, we must also talk about our responsibility to the people who are dying and suffering in, I would hope, even greater measure because as I go to committees around the world, they keep talking more and more about how we guarantee that we did not lose a bag of flour, and that every dime and dollar went to where it went. It is like asking the fire brigade if it realises there is a global shortage of water, while it is putting out the fire. The reaction one get is: "Do you want me to put out the fire, or do you want me to save water?" In the Somalia scenario, in 2011 there were such restrictions on the so-called aid integrity issue that the aid remained, in large part, in warehouses in Nairobi. This was because we could not meet those standards, because if anybody at a checkpoint were to steal a bag of flour, it would be denoted that we were supporting terrorism. The reality on the ground is that if zero loss in a conflict scenario is the standard, then we cannot deliver aid. What happens? The kids on the other side of that armed group's checkpoint starve because one cannot get through effectively.

It gets much more difficult when one has to deal with reality on these issues. Is one sack out of 100 okay to lose? In pubs, there is a spillage allowance that is written off every day, not as theft, just as the reality of the spillage of beer. Yet there is no understanding of the equivalent situation in the delivery of humanitarian assistance, between the truck travelling 100 miles and the truck arriving with a bag of flour broken, or whatever, because the assumption is that if any loss must be fraud. This issue has been overly politicised. I again ask the committee to help us on this issue as we try to stay with the reality of saving lives in a conflict setting. We have to make sure that there is the highest possible standard of accountability that any normal man, woman or child would expect for their funding for the aid effort, but that this standard does not go into a stratosphere which is disconnected from reality. This is what resulted in the shame that we had in the Somalia famine back in 2011 where, because the restrictions were so zero-tolerant of the risk and reality that one faces day-to-day in a conflict zone, the aid was not deployed. Over 200,000 people died because we could not send the aid in under those circumstances, and that is not acceptable either.

I just wanted to take the opportunity to bring up this issue because I know that this committee is very grounded in reality. There more members that travel and see at first hand, the better. We also have to address this issue in a way that does not allow anybody to hijack it and does not leave us so that we are fully accountable on the one hand, and then we are just doing a paper exercise that is disconnected from the reality on the ground on the other hand. As everybody knows, that prevents one from actually doing the job that one should be doing. As I said, in the example of a fire brigade, at that moment it is about water conservation or putting out the fire. The task is to put out the fire. We have a task to save lives and there will be certain loss in that endeavour, which is a genuine reality of getting to help people and save their lives. I thank the committee.