Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

On the issue raised by Deputy Micheál Martin concerning the murder of a servant of this State, Deputy Adams has volunteered to make a statement to the House. Will the Taoiseach agree to time being provided tomorrow for that to occur?

In the last few weeks we have been presented with a number of Supplementary Estimates covering a variety of Departments, including the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. By the time this Dáil rises for Christmas the Appropriations Bill will have been passed, as is required by law. In Ireland, we have many problems that this House seeks to address week in, week out but I am sure we are all agreed that around the world there are people in much worse situations as we approach Christmas. Wars are raging in Syria and Yemen and hundreds of thousands of people have become refugees, not to mention the thousands of people who have died as a result of war this year. Over the last couple of days we have had reports of 400,000 children at risk of famine in northern Nigeria in areas devastated by civil war and Boko Haram.

As a country, we pledged to provide 0.7% of national income in overseas development aid. In truth, we are not making much progress on that target. The Government claimed on budget day that an extra €10 million was provided for overseas development aid. It turns out, however, that this was just the minimum we had to provide to the EU development budget as part of our required overall contribution thereto. There was, in fact, no increase in the amount of money provided for Irish Aid, the distributor of Irish money provided in this year's budget.

In our worst days, the Taoiseach will recall that we managed to protect our overseas development aid expenditure. Some €40 million extra was provided last year but this year we have taken a step backwards. Our aid budget, as a percentage of our national income, will be less than 0.3% next year. It is falling.

Last week, we heard reports of the Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael Noonan, assuring the Fine Gael parliamentary party that there was plenty of money in the coffers to recover the cost of refunding water charges, which I welcome. The Exchequer returns published last week confirmed that tax revenues and under-expenditure are sufficient to give breathing space to some expenditure. In that context, some increase in the latter weeks of this year for the Irish aid budget is appropriate. The Labour Party proposed in its alternative budget an increase of 5%, or €32 million, which is not an inordinately big sum. It is one that we can afford. Will the Taoiseach agree to increasing our aid budget by €32 million, a move that would not only attract widespread support in this House but also among the people?

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