Sir, - On January 27th, 1997, just four months before the general election, Mr Bertie Ahern invited representatives of various development aid NGOs to attend a Fianna Fail policy seminar which you reported in detail the next day.
He was surprisingly explicit in the undertakings he gave to the organisations represented. He promised that FF, if returned to office, would guarantee to maintain the growth of the Overseas Aid budget and would increase it by 0.05 per cent of GNP every year till it reached 0.45 per cent at the end of a normal Dail term.
When FF came into office the GNP share had reached 0.31 per cent. In 1999 we will see an actual fall in GNP share, even with the new O'Donnell package. Ms O'Donnell, after three more years, will at best end her term of office with a GNP share just about level with the share that existed on the day she took over from me in Iveagh House.
The policy reversal she announced last week is truly breathtaking. In one stroke she has enacted a derogation from the standard international link between the aid budget and GNP which is accepted in every other Western state. She has replaced this with a three-year budget that cuts completely the link between our aid programme and our national wealth.
The announcement by the Minister cuts right across the commitment freely made by Bertie Ahern on behalf of Fianna Fail on January 27th, 1997. The NGOs came along to hear him on his invitation. His promises were spelt out in crystal clear language without the slightest trace of ambiguity. Today those promises are only so much hot air. The Government itself calculated what the cash implications of that promise would be and published the results. The 1999 ODA budget ought to be £172.7 million. Anything less is a direct U-turn on the Ahern promise and could bring our country shamefully close again to the bottom of the European league. - Yours, etc., Joan Burton,
Vice Chairperson, Labour Party, Old Cabra Road, Dublin 7.