Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)

I appreciate the good work the Minister of State is doing and I am sure he is chairing the group well. However, I am still left with the two questions. Irish Aid is structured so that the funding is voted to the Department of Foreign Affairs. It is not only a case of who takes the decision but also who forms the options. Is it the case that the interdepartmental committee is forming the options so the proposals are moved from Irish Aid and are now the possession of the interdepartmental committee?

The second issue relates to the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs, of which I am a long-standing member. If that committee's sub-committee on development asks the interdepartmental committee to make a presentation to it, will it be Irish Aid which attends or representatives of the full committee? Will they be able to tell the sub-committee how proposals are initiated, processed and decided?

On a final point, I need an assurance that the role of Irish Aid would not simply be that its staff would monitor the expenditure on projects that have been decided outside the Department, which might not necessarily make the aid side of the issue the priority criteria for decision-making.

See this speech in context