Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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Question 12: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs when it is proposed to establish a governance unit as proposed in the White Paper and in Irish Aid's operational plan. [21833/09]

Peter Power (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)
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The White Paper on Irish Aid recommended the establishment of a Governance Unit tasked with ensuring that governance and corruption issues are taken into account across the work of the programme. I am happy to report that work is being completed on the development of Good Governance Guidelines which set out a framework to guide our overall approach to this area.

In line with the White Paper, the internal reorganisation of Irish Aid has now been completed to reflect the commitment to governance and corruption issues. Governance is an area to be mainstreamed across the aid programme. Responsibility for work on governance, as a mainstreamed area, is being shared across the various sections within Irish Aid. Specific focus is being given to this through a Governance Team comprising officers from a number of sections in Irish Aid. This Governance Team will also work closely with the Human Rights Unit and the Conflict Resolution Unit in the Department to develop programme strategies in the area of human rights and support to peace-building and post-conflict governance.

The Governance Team will oversee implementation of the approach and ensure coherence across the range of Irish Aid activities. It will provide a planning resource for Irish Aid as a whole in making choices and identifying priorities among possible governance interventions. It will monitor research, lessons-learned, evaluation and best practice on governance ensuring that this informs Irish Aid's actions, taking account of the linkages between good governance and the other cross-cutting issues.

At country level, locally-recruited governance advisors will continue to provide advice and support to the management team in implementing the programme.