Neale Richmond (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Cathaoirleach. I will address each of these points very briefly and there will be supplementary questions. When it comes to the absolute horrors unfolding in Gaza, the priority has to be restoring humanitarian corridors and getting real levels of humanitarian aid to the people in Gaza, who are living in conditions that, to be honest, none of us can possibly imagine, even those who have worked in some of the most challenging environments in the world. The poverty and deprivation experienced is being compounded by a full-scale military attack. It is extremely harrowing. This is something we continue to prioritise and push. Our funding is being made available. Many of the foreign staff who were working in Gaza have left. Most of them left back in March. Certainly any Irish staff working for UNRWA did so. Now they find themselves either in Egypt or Jordan and are operating from there. Local staff continue, in the most difficult of situations, to try their best in this regard.

With regard to spending on aid, it is important to stress the levels of scrutiny that go into it. Irish Aid is fully subject to the Comptroller and Auditor General. There is a full audit committee in the Department and each of our embassies is subject to audits in country also. All of the auditors from our missions in Africa are in Dublin at present for a best practice exchange conference. It is something we take extremely seriously. People are right to want to know that taxpayers' money is being spent properly and effectively and that it is getting, in the most efficient manner, to the people who need it the most. I reiterate Senator Stephenson's point that using locally led endeavours is the most effective way of getting support to people who need it most, particularly in a development setting.

In relation to the phrase, "the furthest behind first", I cannot claim ownership over it at all. It is a long-standing Irish Aid value that someone far more intelligent than me developed quite some time ago. It really gets to the point of what we are trying to achieve in terms of supporting those people who are most vulnerable. Quite simply, to be a girl in certain countries means being more vulnerable than a boy. This is about ensuring those people are supported, especially in conflict areas and very unstable conditions.

Moving to the diaspora and the support given in that regard, in the context of the query posed by Senator O'Reilly, as I alluded to earlier, our emigrant support programme has funding of €16.5 million and this has been a consistent amount. We will probably have a similar amount going out next year. We recently closed applications for support under that programme and we look forward to making those announcements in due course of the organisations that will receive that funding. As I said, more than 60% of that support would generally go to those most vulnerable. Many of them are elderly people. When my uncle, for example, left Cootehill in the 1950s, the England he went to was very different. Equally, the Ireland he left was completely unrecognisable from the Ireland we know today. Many of the challenges faced by that generation are being manifested in later life through ill-health and mental health issues. As I mentioned, more pertinently, there are also those people who are survivors of institutional abuse.

To conclude in this round, when we talk about how we use the Irish-American political base or engage with it, as the committee will be aware, during the course of this St. Patrick's week nine Government Ministers and Ministers of State went to 15 US states. They engaged with the Irish-American business community and societal groups to ensure that the interests of Ireland and, indeed, of Europe, were made quite clear. I refer to the economic relationship, which we have not really touched upon much in this discussion understandably. That may be for another day. It is important, though, that the economic relationship is championed and it is explained just how important the EU-US trading relationship is to the global economic order. Equally, it is important to emphasise how it is a reciprocal relationship. Ireland is a major investor in the United States. More Americans are employed by Irish companies in the US than there are Irish people employed by American companies here. It is a trading relationship of extreme benefit. When we take goods and services together, it is also a fairly balanced relationship. Several Irish companies have made large purchases from American companies in recent years. This is about utilising those connections. Part of doing this involves one of the two new forums brought together by the Tánaiste of Irish-American business leaders. These are people who are of Irish heritage or working for Irish companies. The intention is to ensure we can have that engagement on the ground.