John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)

I will give the Minister of State five minutes now as it is the end of the first round. To summarise what has been raised by committee members, clearly Gaza has been a very strong theme from every speaker on this committee. I want to add my voice to this. The Minister of State has been very clear on cuts to USAID. Other points have been raised on how we use our Irish-American political base, perhaps not more effectively but whether there are other things we could do. I mentioned the diaspora to the Minister of State and I ask him to flesh it out a little. How is it manifesting on the ground, particularly in the US? What granular detail is the Minister of State getting?

How can we be sure that spending on aid gets to the people we want it to get to? There is also the issue of moving away from the colonial approach to aid. States decreasing aid and moving away from the UN 0.7% commitment is a common theme among the questions. The privatisation of aid was mentioned by a number of speakers. Cutting aid in favour of defence was also raised. Questions were asked about aid to Ukraine.

The diaspora was a very strong theme and some very practical questions were asked, which the Minister of State has answered. Perhaps we will get a note from the Minister of State on this. There were some questions about PRSI and driver licences. While they are not the responsibility of the Minister of State's Department, they have been a strong theme today and they would be some of the easier issues to come back with a note on. I certainly like the Minister of State's theme of "the furthest behind first". He said there has been an increase in deportations. Perhaps he will flesh this out and give it context. He said it is a little bit too early to tell the impact of the USAID cuts, but what is he hearing? What are the fears around it? We will have witnesses coming before the committee in that regard. Support for elderly emigrants was also specifically mentioned, as was the HIV and AIDS programme, which was raised a number of times. On Gaza, action rather than words is a theme I have heard here and no doubt we will return to it. I will give the Minister of State five minutes and we will then go into round two.