Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Conor Lenihan said he was opposed to enshrining Ireland's overseas aid target in legislation.
"There is cross-party support that we should achieve the 0.7 per cent target by 2012. While other parties may have liked to see it reached earlier, when I took this job, I decided the target time had to be reframed because it was not realistic. Legislating for it has been raised by several deputies, but I am not sure whether it would be helpful."
Mr Lenihan said the Department of Finance was tracking percentages and not looking at increases in cash or volume of aid. According to GNP, as it stood at the start of the estimates process, the Department allocated the percentage amount which met the requirement to reach the 0.7 per cent target.
He added that when the new timeframe of 2012 was set, benchmark figures were set down to be reached if Ireland was to prove its sincerity in meeting the final target. Those were milestone dates: to achieve 0.5 per cent next year and 0.6 per cent by 2010.
"We are well in position in achieving these milestones. Next year, we will have reached 0.5 per cent of GNP."
Fine Gael foreign affairs spokesman Bernard Allen said that the Taoiseach had promised, at the UN in 2000, that the Government would reach the 0.7 per cent target by next year. This should be enshrined in law.
Labour's spokesman Michael D Higgins claimed the five strongest economies in the EU were camouflaging their figures and were not likely to reach the 2015 target.
"They are doing this by including matters under the official development target that have nothing to do with development, such as education of refugees, providing information and so forth."
