Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

As I stated previously, I would like Ireland to be the number one subscriber to overseas development aid in the world. We lie at about number seven or eight in the world. This is an extraordinary achievement for this country and everybody should be proud of it. We subscribe the better part of €600 million towards overseas development aid, more than the entire capital programme for health in this country. Every year we are increasing our overseas development aid package by a vast amount. In the last budget, the first by the Minister for Finance, Deputy Cowen, a €1.8 billion package for overseas development aid for the next three years was outlined.

I am thankful that we are now able to help NGOs to do their job. They cannot do it without the money. I am proud that under the Governments I have led, we have increased our overseas development aid contribution from €150 million to over €600 million. With the packages that have been announced, this will amount to approximately €700 million by 2007.

See this speech in context