Standing room only for over 500 invited guests in the historic Round Room of Dublin's Mansion House; a snazzy intro film to set the mood; the Taoiseach as Master of Ceremonies - it was clear no expense was being spared yesterday for the launch of the White Paper on Irish aid to the poorest people in the world. Paul Cullen reports.
This is the first time a White Paper has been published on overseas aid in the 32 years since an official State-funded programme was set up in 1974. In the early days, the amounts of money being spent were so small they hardly needed intensive scrutiny, but with a projected €1.5 billion a year being spent by 2012 - probably more than the budget for the Garda Síochána or the Defence Forces by then - that is clearly no longer the case.
Few in the aid business expected any real surprises from yesterday's White Paper, and so it has turned out. The document prefers a deepening of Ireland's involvement in its traditional areas to any radical broadening or diversification; this is hardly surprising given the high regard in which the Irish programme is held. Thus, Malawi joins six other African countries (and two in Asia) as a priority country, and Africa remains the main focus for our assistance.
Just a few years after Apso, the Agency for Personal Service Overseas, was wound up, there is a "new" proposal to create an Irish Aid Information and Volunteering Centre offering similar services for people who wish to volunteer in the developing world. The proposal for a rapid response initiative to enable Ireland to react more effectively to humanitarian emergencies is, likewise, something that was tried by Apso in the past. Concern and other aid agencies run their own rapid response teams and may be less than impressed at the duplication of effort. There is a sense of deja vu about this document, given that it is only five years since a major examination of the aid programme was carried out. The minister who chaired that exercise, Liz O'Donnell, said last year she saw no need for a White Paper given that she had carried out a "total review" of the programme.
Both reviews looked at the geographical spread of the programme, capacity and staffing issues, the mix of activities involved and policy areas such as HIV/Aids. "We decided to stay, and deepen our engagement, with Africa, to increase the capacity of the missionaries and NGOs who depend on our resources for their excellent work and to carefully expand into other poor African countries on a gradual basis," Ms O'Donnell reported - a verdict that is reached again in this latest document.
The one thing that has changed profoundly in the past five years is the funding situation. The Government made a solemn commitment to increase spending on aid to the UN target of 0.7 per cent of gross national product, but then reneged on this promise. Now it has rowed in again behind the commitment and has delivered an extra €190 million in aid this year as evidence of its early good faith.
The main function of the White Paper is to anchor this commitment further through repetition, and to set out an agenda describing how the money will be spent. Presumably, once commitments have been made to fund deserving causes, future governments will find it harder to welsh on their promises. With so much money swishing around, it was easy for Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern and his junior Minister, Conor Lenihan, to promise more support for a variety of areas, such as the UN, combating HIV/Aids, human rights and Fair Trade produce.
Aid agencies have given the document a warm welcome - and why wouldn't they, given that they will be among the principal beneficiaries of the extra money?
As well as the rapid response initiative, there are proposals for a hunger task force, a unit for conflict analysis and resolution and an internal governance unit. However, while the documents bristles with references to combating corruption and coherence between the policies of different government departments, the specifics of tackling these challenges are largely absent.
The White Paper does however, make useful proposals for increasing public scrutiny of the aid sector. The remit of the Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs is to be extended to take in Irish aid, the Oireachtas will host regular debates on development and all external evaluations and public spending reviews are to be published.
But now that the programme is being expanded, will there be anyone left to run it? There is huge opposition among specialist staff in Irish Aid to its decentralisation to Limerick next year, and less than half the posts to be moved have been filled, it emerged yesterday.