Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I pay tribute to the life and work of Sally O'Neill Sanchez whose sudden passing was a terrible shock. I met her on several occasions. She was a tremendous advocate for the work of Trócaire and could speak passionately about the way financial assistance transformed the lives of people and entire communities in the poorest parts of the world.

That human story is what we cannot lose sight of as we debate the budget figures and the percentage allocations of resources.

Overseas development assistance, ODA, is about making a vital difference to the lives of the most disadvantaged people on the planet. We give most of our overseas development assistance through Irish Aid, but I want to focus my remarks on our entire ODA contribution. According to the OECD, the genesis of the idea behind ODA is the time when Hugh Gaitskell was leader of the British Labour Party when he wanted it to be part of his political programme in the 1950s. By 1970, the UN target for official state aid of 0.7% of GNI was agreed to by a range of countries, including Ireland. We pledged to meet this target by 1975, or 1980 at the latest, but we did not meet either of these target dates. As part of the millennium development goals, in 2005 we recommitted to meeting the target by 2015.

Ireland is home to a number of leading humanitarian organisations. We rightly celebrate their work and acknowledge the charitable giving of the people to the least developed peoples everywhere. We are a generous nation, yet even during the last economic boom we did not meet the 0.7% target. The nearest we came was 0.59% of GNI, or several hundred million euro short, but, as others said, this percentage has slipped to just 0.31% in the figures just released by the OECD. When we did not meet the target in 2015, we set a new date of 2025. In 2018, as part of its A Better World strategy, the Government recommitted to meeting the target, this time by 2030. We have 11 years left to meet this challenging target, 55 years later than the original target, but it is something on which we have to set our sights.

It is worth remembering from where the 0.7% figure came. It was derived from the econometric work of the Dutch economist Jan Tinbergen. He estimated the level of income flow necessary for developing economies to achieve sufficient economic growth rates in order that they would be genuinely moving towards materially improving the lives of their populations. Developing countries need an inflow of hard currency from developed countries to power their economic capacity. That is part of the reason we need to achieve the 0.7% target. It is an important point. Development aid is not charity. It is not a handout to poorer countries that wealthy countries will keep giving forever. The purpose of giving a sufficiently strong level of development support is to end poverty and give real capacity to countries to no longer require it. Modern economic analysis suggests a figure of 0.7% might not be enough anymore as the economic gulf between richer and poorer countries widens. However, the United Nations, the OECD and other international bodies have kept faith with the 0.7% target because it is a necessary first step to allow the least developed countries to set themselves on a real, irreversible path to catch up.

I am heartened by information from the United Nations, the World Bank and other organisations that shows that the relative number in extreme poverty around the world is decreasing, even though it is still unconscionably high. We have seen extraordinary economic development in China, India and other Asian countries, across Africa and some parts of Latin America. However, there are still countries that are so disadvantaged they will never escape the cycle of poverty unless they are given massive support and we are the only people who can do that. That is why the Labour Party agrees with the national policy of focusing our assistance on some of the least developed and most disadvantaged countries in the world.

The quality of Ireland’s aid is ranked as being very good, but we have to improve the quantity. As I have just said, it is not money lost but money properly, wisely and humanely invested. We get a huge social return on investment in terms of lives saved, children properly nourished and people being given opportunities they would never have had in terms of education and their quality of life. We also over time get an economic return because the more countries develop, the more they can trade with us and buy more of our higher value goods and services. The Labour Party does not see development aid as a purely transactional approach but as a social justice issue. For those who are not convinced by such arguments, I remind them that the long-term value for money and return on investment is, even from the narrow perspective of economics, well worth the investment by Ireland in reaching its 0.7% of GNI target. The United Kingdom meets the 0.7% target and has made it a legal obligation since 2015, with cross-party support in the House of Commons. The latest figures also show that Demark, Luxembourg and Sweden all meet the target, as does Norway. In fact, Sweden gives over 1% of GNI in ODA. This is the peer group among which we should want to count ourselves. If they can do it, we can. We can afford do so.

That leaves me with some genuine questions for all of us in this House. First, is there any serious party or group in this House that does not believe we should achieve the target? I genuinely do not think so. If that is true, what does it mean in practice? We are giving around €850 million in overseas development assistance. The association of development organisations, Dóchas, estimates that this sum needs to rise to around €1.66 billion to represent 0.7% of GNI, an increase of over €800 million. It would be a sizeable jump, a big demand. However, if we are serious about achieving the target by 2030, it will require €75 million or more every year to be added to our ODA budget. We have to be serious about providing that level of money. So far, the Government has indicated its support to reach the target of 0.7%, but it has not yet published an incremental timeline, year on year, from now until 2030 in respect of by how much the ODA Vote will grow to achieve that target.

The A Better World strategy is good on our spending priorities and ties into the sustainable development goals, but we need to say on what we are going to spend the money to make sure we actually spend the quantity we want to spend. One option, on which I challenge everyone in the House, is for us to legislate, like the United Kingdom, to require every Government that will take office up to 2030 to meet this target by specified increments, on which we will all agree, year by year, until 2030. That would be a real roadmap. Such a law would have to come from the Government because, on this side of the House, we cannot propose the incurring of expenditure. However, I pledge my party to support it. The uncomfortable truth is that while economic growth might provide us with €75 million in one year, it probably will not do it every year. It requires fixed and consistent annual commitment, in good times and bad. When it comes to meeting our commitment to overseas development assistance, let us not be afraid to make the hard decisions that we will have to make collectively in the next 11 years.

The elimination of poverty is the first goal listed in the sustainable development goals to which we have signed up to achieve. The World Bank defines “extreme poverty” as living on less than $1.90 a day. It is estimated that there 736 million people living in extreme poverty, half of them in India, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia and Bangladesh. Ireland is one of the richest countries in the world and we have a moral responsibility to those left behind. Ultimately, we will all be held to account, not in the annual debate we have here but on a commitment that, when it comes to the next budget, we will actually act de réir ár mbriathar. The only way to make sure we will not talk about it for another 55 years is to enact the legislation for which I pledge my party's support.

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