John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses. They referred to the spend on security and defence. That is becoming an issue across committees. I ask that they look at this matter from the following perspective. Given a choice between spending on humanitarian inputs or local housing or on security and defence, there is not a democratically elected politician across the European Union who would not choose to the former. However, we are at a particular juncture. Our ODA has been impacted as a result of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which has eaten into it. This shows what conflict does.

My second point is that security and defence means protecting our assets. Those assets, like undersea cables and the architecture and hardware that is going to facilitate a further digital revolution in the space of artificial intelligence, are critical to the future economic development of the country. Without corporation tax receipts, there will be no increases in ODA for anybody.

It is about making the connection between economic wealth and the ability of a state to fulfil, improve and increase its commitments and I do not hear that. I do not mean to be critical, but that is just the reality. The European Union faces an existential threat. If Russia were to take another step, we would all be under threat. I would like to hear some of that represented in some of the contributions because I do not. I hear criticism of it. Other members will have different views. I do not want to spend money on increased militarisation but I recognise, as was mentioned, our values, principles and interests, which are known globally. We have values and principles, but we also have interests and unless our interests are maintained and safeguarded there will not be any funding to back up the principles and values we bring to the world. I feel strongly about that.

We had a meeting last week with the Gates Foundation. It is heartbreaking to see the progress being made until the US decided to pull the plug so significantly on funding, being interrupted, which leaves us all carrying the can. It is a challenge. We are not great at philanthropy in Ireland. We could look at tax incentives for that. Other countries are really good at it, such as the UK. We are talking about philanthropists being able to make significant deductions from tax. If the witnesses have anything to say about that, I would be interested in how we compare internationally. I think we compare badly.

On the programmes being hit most, Concern is in a number of countries. The Gates Foundation was impressive on mother and baby health and the eradication of some diseases, which we have taken for granted. When aid agencies get money they can do profoundly good work and they do so. They are just a few observations. The witnesses have my remaining time to respond.