In an excellent White Paper the Government has spelled out its decision that Ireland should meet the United Nations' target of spending 0.7 per cent of gross national income on overseas aid by 2012.
It reaffirms the core values on which the policy underlying Irish Aid's work is based. These include concentrating assistance on the poorest people in nine African states, giving priority to health and education and insisting that it should not be tied to trade or other relationships with Ireland.
Overall, the document deepens existing policy, rather than broadening or realigning it. Major new resources are committed, along with a number of initiatives to give aid a higher public profile. It deserves widespread attention and cross-party agreement to achieve these objectives. A 0.5 per cent spend is planned next year (some €800 million), 0.6 per cent in 2010 and a hefty doubling of the existing budget to €1.5 billion by 2012.
This would put development aid within the second rank of spending departments, well below health, education or social welfare but on a par with spending on the Garda, the Defence Forces and within shouting distance of industry and labour or agriculture. It is real money which inevitably will compete with other budgetary lines, and this makes the cross-departmental commitment to the policy in the White Paper a significant political fact. A major review is planned of the Irish Aid management to ensure it has the resources and capacity necessary to handle this phase of growth.
Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern says the new aid programme and its associated international engagement represents a third historic phase of Irish foreign policy, following on from the achievement first of sovereign independence, and then of peace and prosperity over the last generation. Ireland can be a bridge between the developing and developed worlds by virtue of having itself made the transition from one to the other. This is an ambitious and idealistic vision, but it is appropriate to these commitments and could serve as a benchmark to evaluate them.
Ways must be found for the public to engage more fully with Irish Aid's new role. There is no doubting the public interest in the subject, nor that it now has a substantial and growing constituency. Direct contacts and access help enormously. The initiatives announced on rapid response to emergencies, public encouragement of voluntary work in development, enhanced Oireachtas scrutiny and a higher media profile will help. So will the setting up of new units on conflict prevention and governance and a hunger taskforce in the Department of Foreign Affairs.