Aid embarrassingly little: Tim Costello

Following up a comment from Bob Geldof, sorry, Sir Bob, Tim Costello has criticised Australian government aid efforts which have slipped from a third of a percent of GDP when Howard came to power to a quarter of a percent.

The agreed target for developing nations is a little less than three quarters of a percent and under the current mean-spirited scrooges Australian giving has fallen to the bottom of the table when compared to other wealthy nations. All this as our star is rising economically compared to others and we are more prosperous than we've been for a fair time.

Sir Bob famously organised Live Aid in the UK, a blockbuster concert raising money for the starving in Africa. It was so prominent that American artists felt challenged to organise a similar concert. It was of course followed by some disillusionment when Africa's problems didn't disolve overnight but Sir Bob has remained involved in the cause over the subsequent 10 to 20 years. His comment that Australian government aid was "embarrasingly pathetic" is likely targeted at the most self-absorbed of the OECD countries (the rich nations club) in an attempt to raise the bar and stop other nations following our poor example.

A target of 0.7% of GDP has been set for OECD countries with some reason to believe that if all OECD nations consistently gave this much poverty, hunger and preventable disease could be fairly efficiently combatted. The Greens and the Dems support this target but the major parties are a little more vague and Howard is clearly opposed to it. No doubt as with the Kyoto protocol Australia is some kind of special case in his mind.

Add to this the fact that most of our government aid is not spent in the most efficient way possible, eg. by paying East Timorese workers to rebuild the country. Instead we engage in what is called boomerang aid: we pay Australian companies and Australian workers to carry out projects overseas. This allows Howard to talk about creating jobs, and Kerry Packer's aid organisation to turn a profit but means that in reality our government gives far less than the already woeful 0.26% of GDP.

Staying at the old, still woeful, level of giving would be a trivial burden on the Australian taxpayer (7c a day, $25 a year) but is well summed up by Tim Costello:

"That would literally save lives, thousands of lives," he said.

Reducing an already poor level of giving and engaging in boomerang giving in atime of prosperity is just mean-spirited penny-pinching.

AidWatch an NGO monitoring aid spending and its uses recommends writing letters to the editor of the SMH. Having heard a Christian journalist for the SMH speak about the industry and his attempts to get pro-aid articles published let me tell you that responses to these kind of articles matter. Editors do actually pay attention to what readers say and somethign that receives no comment suggests no interest from the reader, many letters to the editor provide a basis for a journalist to argue for further articles to get published.

So email:
letters@smh.com.au

AidWatch adds:

LETTERS ALREADY PUBLISHED
Bob Geldof is out of touch with the majority of Australians as he
wonders why we don't give more to alleviate world hunger ("PM urged to
lift aid", /Herald/, November 10). <>Bob doesn't understand that the
majority are more worried about mortgages and extracting as much money
as the Government will throw at them to buy their votes than worrying
about social issues, other than "family values" and "morality". Too bad,
Bob. Your cause is noble but you're knocking at the wrong door.

*George Delaportas, Sefton, November 10.* <>Sir Bob Geldof wants
Australia to spend more money on foreign aid. However, he fails to
inform the public exactly which group of unfortunate Australians the
Federal Government is expected to cease helping so we might send a few
billion dollars more to poor African countries whose totalitarian
leaderships would quickly steal away anything we gave in goodwill.
*Benjamin Smith, Glenmore Park, November 10.*

Letter Writing Tips:
Keep it to 150 – 200 words
1. Refer to the most important point in the first paragraph.
2. Reference the title, date and author of the original piece in your
opening sentence if you are responding to a previously written article.
In this case (Aid embarrassingly little: Tim Costello, AAP, Nov. 10th 2004)
3. Write between 100 and 200 words - shorter is better. No more than
three quick paragraphs.
4. Suggest what the reporter/author should have said.
5. Do not waste space repeating what the article said. Instead, begin
with your main point.
6. Attach a contact phone number and residential address, in addition to
your name
7. Send it in ASAP

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