Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)

I propose to share time with any representative of the Green Party or Independent Deputy.

I welcome this Bill, to put the Minister of State at his ease, from the outset, as it provides for further assistance from Ireland to developing countries to help redress the gross economic imbalance on our planet. The Asian Development Bank is a multilateral development finance institution dedicated to reducing poverty in Asia and the Pacific. Established in 1966, it now has 64 members, I note, mostly from the region. Of the non-regional members, most are from Europe. With this Bill this State will now be included in that number. I hope in future we can make a valuable and constructive contribution.

I welcome also the extension of activities of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to include Mongolia. I see no difficulty with the more technical parts of the Bill to allow for changes to administrative and financial arrangements regarding multilateral institutions to be made by Dáil resolution. I record my acceptance of that.

I want to deal with a number of issues concerning overseas development aid. The European Union Financial Perspectives 2007-13 currently being negotiated is a cause of major concern. If adopted in its current form, it will reduce the development aid allocation as a proportion of spending, while increasing the security orientated budgets. It will increase spending on the European Common and Security Policy and include development aid within this remit. It would allow the Commission more discretion to reallocate resources and diminish the European Parliament's role, making it difficult to know how much the EU is spending on development, with the grouping of developing and non-developing countries together, making allocations more difficult to monitor. These are among the concerns I have.

Sinn Féin, as my colleagues and I have recorded here on many occasions, rejects the securitisation of EU official development aid and the financing of security and counter-terrorism measures from already stretched EU overseas development aid budget lines. We also reject the inclusion of military expenditure in ODA, which will create a distorted picture by inflating formal ODA levels without strengthening poverty reduction activities in developing countries. I urge the Government to oppose this trend. It should advocate instead the development of clear and objective criteria for the allocation of EU aid and do everything possible to ensure poverty eradication remains the overarching goal of EU development assistance in the period 2007-13.

People in developing countries throughout the world are attempting to oppose the undemocratic and unaccountable neo-liberal agenda of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, World Trade Organisation and the transnational corporations which, in the pursuit of profit, are undermining attempts by such countries to pursue economic and social agendas more suitable to their own development and interests.

Our overseas development aid and that of the EU can never be effective in the absence of real change in world economic institutions. We contend that this should include the replacement of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organisation with international institutions which are democratically controlled and whose policies are accountable to and in the long-term interests of developing countries rather than the agendas of rich nations and transnational corporations. We recommend the ending of crippling debt repayments to the World Bank by the poorest countries. We recommend the breaking of the link between international aid packages and the economic agenda of neo-liberalism, which prevents poor nations developing forms of social and economic provision most suited to their interests.

I hope the Minister of State takes on board several of the points I have made. Perhaps in his response he might reflect on them. More importantly, I urge him and his colleagues in Government to take guidance from them and other points made by Opposition voices in the course of this debate on the Development Banks Bill. As I said at the outset, I welcome the Bill and will be supporting it on all Stages.

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