Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I apologise for being delayed. My short contribution, because I do not want to repeat what has been said already, will be on the overseas development aid and all the targets, such as the one of 0.7%. The committee has just heard from Deputy Crowe about what can happen when we get hung up with targets and find empty factories being built just as a contribution is being made. Only that Deputy Crowe was there nobody would ever have known about this empty factory. As a small country with a proud record of work in overseas development, particularly by the religious orders that did a tremendous amount of work in development and teaching, a price cannot be put on that sort of work. We get hung up on figures to show the target of 0.6% or 0.5% has been met. If the money is being wasted in certain areas and other areas are being left short, surely it is time we target exactly what we mean by overseas development aid. As a small country, it is important we narrow it down to certain targets and concentrate on our money going into those areas and not being spread for the sake of reaching a target and throwing money at it.

The reality is we have a load of young, educated, committed people in this country today who can replace the religious orders that went before. Unfortunately the religious orders, whether Catholic or Protestant, are not in a position to supply the sort of personnel that was there before. One of the jobs the committee could do in overseeing overseas development aid is to investigate to develop a system where bright young people from this country could be targeted to go and do certain types of work that we would regard as overseas development aid. It could be in the areas of looking after the health of people or teaching, for example, but the most important thing is to target where our money is going. I am old enough to remember when one had to pay to go to secondary school. Unless one's parents had enough money one did not go to secondary school, one went down to the local tech. I am 73 years of age now. I lived through that. Parents made a huge contribution by saving and going without to send people to secondary school because we did not have free education.

Let us imagine the position those countries would be in if they had targeted free education, and the people to administer, teach, and build up that sort of resource. I think much of our energy and resources, although not only money, should go into supplying that type of assistance. I am absolutely certain that if a proper scheme was developed, it would attract young people to serve abroad for certain periods in certain areas, whether in medicine, teaching, or whatever, and that would be part of meeting our commitment to contribute 0.7% of gross national product. It is time we asked if we are getting the best out of our buck. We must ensure that we do not have the empty factories Deputy Crowe spoke about.

I would like to hear the Minister of State's views on this. It would take a bit of work, and it has to be driven by Government. This has to be ongoing. If there is a change of Government, it should not interfere. The programme should continue on irrespective of who is in government. That will be part our 0.7% contribution. As a small country, we should genuinely review that whole area.