Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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135. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade if his attention has been drawn to the fact that to date many EU countries have persisted in making part of their aid programme conditional on the purchase of goods and services in the donor country, namely tied aid, or in diluting the impact of their aid programme by including costs that, while strictly speaking are allowed under OECD DAC rules, do nothing to combat extreme poverty; the actions he is taking to stop this abuse of aid budgets by other EU countries; the extent to which Ireland itself inflates its ODA spending by including, for example the costs of housing refugees and foreign students in its ODA statistics. [42048/13]

Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)
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Official Development Assistance (ODA) is most effective when it supports the objectives that people, communities and governments themselves decide are priorities for national development and poverty reduction. Delivering ODA as untied aid to developing countries is the best way to ensure that the recipients themselves are in the driving seat and that all development resources, both external and internal, coherently pursue common objectives. Untying also means that more aid is spent in developing countries themselves. This helps create much needed employment.

The OECD estimates suggest that when overseas aid is tied to the procurement of goods and services from the donor country, its effectiveness and efficiency is significantly diminished. Because of this, they recommend that donor countries untie the bulk of their aid to Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and to Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs). Food aid and Technical Co-operation are not covered by the recommendation, although many countries, including Ireland, do untie these categories of aid. In 2010 donors reported that 24 per cent of bilateral aid (US$ 26 billion) was still tied.

Ireland's aid is 100 per cent untied and the OECD has recognised that we are one of only four countries enjoying this distinction. The high quality of our aid programme has been recognised by successive OECD reviews and by other independent assessments on aid quality such as the Commitment to Global Development index and the Real Aid Index.

Ireland's new policy for international development, One World- One Future, approved by the Government earlier this year, once again reaffirmed our commitment to maintaining a high quality aid programme and to untied aid, in particular. It stipulates that our aid is “not conditional on acquiring goods and services from Ireland”.

Ireland has consistently supported the strengthening of the OECD recommendation on untying aid and the inclusion of untied aid as a key measure of aid quality against which donor progress on aid and development effectiveness should be measured. The commitments that donors made at the 2011 Busan High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness include accelerating progress and improving transparency on aid untying. Ensuring that these commitments become part of the post-2015 development framework was one of the priorities for the Irish Presidency of the EU - and this is successfully reflected in the EU Council Conclusions of June this year on the Post 2015 Framework.

A number of students from Ireland's Key Partner Countries and from other developing countries study in Ireland, before returning to their own countries, as part of our overall programme of capacity building. Ireland also provides funding to allow students undertake studies in their own countries or the region. A very small proportion of Ireland's ODA is made up of specific costs associated with international refugees during their first 12 month of stay seeking asylum in Ireland, in line with the OECD Development Assistance Committee's ODA reporting directives.

Dominic Hannigan (Meath East, Labour)
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136. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade if his attention has been drawn to the Act Now on 2015 e-mail campaign; his plans for overseas development aid in 2014; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42373/13]

Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)
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I am aware of the Act Now on 2015 e-mail campaign regarding Ireland’s commitment to Official Development Assistance (ODA) The Government is committed to Ireland’s overseas aid programme. This commitment was expressed and enhanced by the publication earlier this year of our new Policy on International Development, “One World, One Future” which clearly sets out our vision for a sustainable and just world, and our goals and areas of focus for the coming years. It also reaffirms the centrality of the aid programme to our foreign policy.

The new policy states clearly our commitment to achieving the UN target of providing 0.7% of Gross National Product (GNP) for ODA when economic circumstances permit.

Over the past two years, the Government has broadly stabilised the budget for development assistance – allocating €629 million on ODA in 2012 and €622 million in 2013. These very significant allocations of public funds clearly demonstrate how we consolidated the development assistance budget - a major achievement in light of the very difficult fiscal conditions facing the Government. Equally importantly, our aid programme remains one of the best in the world and our leadership on the hunger and nutrition agendas continues to be acknowledged internationally. The Estimates process for Budget 2014 is now in its final stages and is being framed in the context of the Government’s overall fiscal consolidation strategy. The Departmental budget allocations for 2014 will be a matter for Government decision and will be announced in the Budget Statement next week.