Now that cuts in spending seem to be on the agenda of all the main political parties, the big questions still to be answered are: how much? And where will the axe fall?
According to a recent poll by Ipsos MORI, published by the BBC (http://bit.ly/d168R), the most popular candidate with most people is overseas aid.
That’s not really surprising. It’s understandable that during severe financial crisis most people want our government to look after our own affairs first. Charity, as the saying goes, begins at home. But is it really right for the poorest nations of the world to be penalised for a crisis that was brought on by the rich?
The developing world already spends $1.3 on debt repayment for every $1 it receives in grants (Source: World Centric, http://bit.ly/b5C7f). Every day at least $100 million flows from the poor of the world into the pockets of the rich. Existing problems like drought and famine will not go away just because there is a worldwide recession, and the poor are more deeply affected than the rich. If you are a subsistence farmer and the market price for your crop falls, it doesn’t mean that you can’t buy the new tele you had your eye on. That was never an option anyway. But it might mean that your kids starve to death.
Contrary to popular belief, the sums involved in overseas aid are vanishingly small compared with the overall cost of the crisis. The money spent by the UK government to prop up the very financial system that maintains most of the world in poverty - £218 billion pounds so far – is over 100 times the entire GNP of some of the poorest nations, such as Guyana and Burundi (£2 billion each).
Given that financial inequality is also a recognised driver behind some rather negative social trends, such as economic migration and terrorism, cutting overseas aid would be a very short-sighted and rather petty response by a relatively wealthy and hopefully civilised nation to a problem that is, after all, mostly of our own making.
According to a recent poll by Ipsos MORI, published by the BBC (http://bit.ly/d168R), the most popular candidate with most people is overseas aid.
That’s not really surprising. It’s understandable that during severe financial crisis most people want our government to look after our own affairs first. Charity, as the saying goes, begins at home. But is it really right for the poorest nations of the world to be penalised for a crisis that was brought on by the rich?
The developing world already spends $1.3 on debt repayment for every $1 it receives in grants (Source: World Centric, http://bit.ly/b5C7f). Every day at least $100 million flows from the poor of the world into the pockets of the rich. Existing problems like drought and famine will not go away just because there is a worldwide recession, and the poor are more deeply affected than the rich. If you are a subsistence farmer and the market price for your crop falls, it doesn’t mean that you can’t buy the new tele you had your eye on. That was never an option anyway. But it might mean that your kids starve to death.
Contrary to popular belief, the sums involved in overseas aid are vanishingly small compared with the overall cost of the crisis. The money spent by the UK government to prop up the very financial system that maintains most of the world in poverty - £218 billion pounds so far – is over 100 times the entire GNP of some of the poorest nations, such as Guyana and Burundi (£2 billion each).
Given that financial inequality is also a recognised driver behind some rather negative social trends, such as economic migration and terrorism, cutting overseas aid would be a very short-sighted and rather petty response by a relatively wealthy and hopefully civilised nation to a problem that is, after all, mostly of our own making.
Comments