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€635m to overseas development aid

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  • 08-12-2010 10:42am
    #1
    Johnny Utah
    Registered Users Posts: 2,157 ✭✭✭


    Why is the government still providing €635m in overseas aid?

    We are in dire straits and we simply cannot afford it at present. What a joke, only a matter of time before we default! :mad::mad::mad:


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    #2
    Slydice
    Registered Users Posts: 10,501 ✭✭✭✭Slydice


    well, it's less than we paid last year and it's probably helps some really bad problems in some little way


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    #3
    nhg
    Registered Users Posts: 1,009 ✭✭✭nhg


    Charity has to begin at home... Home needs to be sorted out first before we are in a position to help others.... considering others are helping us....


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    #4
    Donny5
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,827 ✭✭✭Donny5


    I think that money is probably some of the best money this state ever spends. I'd rather cut money from social welfare, pensions, tax relief, health, almost anything else before I'd support dispensing with our foreign aid budget.

    The problems that money is used to try to solve are an order of magnitude worse than the worst problems the least fortunate person in Ireland suffers.


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    #5
    oscarBravo
    Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 28,792 Mod ✭✭✭✭oscarBravo


    nhg wrote: »
    Charity has to begin at home...
    ...but does it have to end there?

    Your point is, in essence, that only when we have manage to keep ourselves in the lifestyle to which we're accustomed should we try to prevent other people from dying from starvation and preventable diseases.

    Not a view I'm willing to subscribe to.


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    #6
    Euroland
    Closed Accounts Posts: 634 ✭✭✭Euroland


    Johnny Utah wrote: »
    Why is the government still providing €635m in overseas aid?

    We are in dire straits and we simply cannot afford it at present. What a joke, only a matter of time before we default! :mad::mad::mad:

    +1, agree, we should scrap it


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    #7
    nhg
    Registered Users Posts: 1,009 ✭✭✭nhg


    Thankfully I among others, were not one of the one's whom had to adjust our lifestyle when firstly both my OH and I took a 20% paycut and then after a few months when the economic downturn slipped further our employment turned from 5day week to 3 day week a year and a half ago. We always lived within our means and thankfully we don't owe anyone a red cent.

    I wish our government representatives had done the same thing when spending our tax money.


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    #8
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 90,921 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    nhg wrote: »
    Charity has to begin at home... Home needs to be sorted out first before we are in a position to help others.... considering others are helping us....
    No one is helping us, people lending us money are making a lot of money at very low risk. In all honesty we should let Anglo fail it was a commercial venture and the inverstors knew the risks.

    No in Ireland will starve to death.
    No one in Ireland will be refused emergency hospital treatment because they can't afford it
    We have the resources to house all the homeless in the ghost estates, / other empty housing - it's a political problem not a financial one.


    Excluding South Africa, Kenya is probably the best developed sub-Saharan country. A casual worker there would make €1 a day. And there is no guarantee of work every day. There is no dole.

    Recently they let 70% of the mine workers in the copper belt in Zambia go. 60% of the population live on less than $2 a day and there is no money to combat poverty since it all came from a windfall tax on copper. ( How much will we make from the Corrib Gas field?? )




    Bottom line is that we have signed up to an EU accord to provide a certain level of foreign aid. So we are legally obliged to do that. Even if it does mean saving lives or providing people with enough education to fend for themselves.

    We have not signed any EU accord to bail out Anglo.


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    #9
    CorkMan
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,005 ✭✭✭CorkMan


    Cut it right down the middle with a 2-foot machete and then explode it with 5KG's of C4.


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    #10
    gurramok
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,992 ✭✭✭✭gurramok


    Capt'n Midnight wrote: »
    Excluding South Africa, Kenya is probably the best developed sub-Saharan country. A casual worker there would make €1 a day. And there is no guarantee of work every day. There is no dole.

    Recently they let 70% of the mine workers in the copper belt in Zambia go. 60% of the population live on less than $2 a day and there is no money to combat poverty since it all came from a windfall tax on copper. ( How much will we make from the Corrib Gas field?? )

    How is what goes on in foreign countries my problem?

    They have governments to look after their own internal affairs.


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    #11
    Euroland
    Closed Accounts Posts: 634 ✭✭✭Euroland


    Capt'n Midnight wrote: »
    No one is helping us, people lending us money are making a lot of money at very low risk. In all honesty we should let Anglo fail it was a commercial venture and the inverstors knew the risks.

    No in Ireland will starve to death.
    No one in Ireland will be refused emergency hospital treatment because they can't afford it
    We have the resources to house all the homeless in the ghost estates, / other empty housing - it's a political problem not a financial one.


    Excluding South Africa, Kenya is probably the best developed sub-Saharan country. A casual worker there would make €1 a day. And there is no guarantee of work every day. There is no dole.

    Recently they let 70% of the mine workers in the copper belt in Zambia go. 60% of the population live on less than $2 a day and there is no money to combat poverty since it all came from a windfall tax on copper. ( How much will we make from the Corrib Gas field?? )

    Bottom line is that we have signed up to an EU accord to provide a certain level of foreign aid. So we are legally obliged to do that. Even if it does mean saving lives or providing people with enough education to fend for themselves.

    Do you want to bring Ireland down to that level? ;)


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    #12
    Euroland
    Closed Accounts Posts: 634 ✭✭✭Euroland


    Capt'n Midnight wrote: »
    We have not signed any EU accord to bail out Anglo.

    +1, agree


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    #13
    Cork boy 55
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,324 ✭✭✭Cork boy 55


    0.671/33 = 2% of the tax money was sent overseas in 2010

    The cut this year in AID was only 5.2%

    Look at this thread for details


    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056082637


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    #14
    donegal11
    Closed Accounts Posts: 689 ✭✭✭donegal11


    A cut of that 600m would go to salaries of admin and management for Irish based staff keeping them in the lifestyle they became used to, It doesn't all go to the third world as you'd like to believe.


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    #15
    Iwannahurl
    Closed Accounts Posts: 8,156 ✭✭✭Iwannahurl


    gurramok wrote: »
    How is what goes on in foreign countries my problem?

    They have governments to look after their own internal affairs.

    And this banana republic has the ECB and IMF to look after ours.

    I think we receive far more in ODA than we ever pay out.


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    #16
    CorkMan
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,005 ✭✭✭CorkMan


    donegal11 wrote: »
    A cut of that 600m would go to salaries of admin and management for Irish based staff keeping them in the lifestyle they became used to, It doesn't all go to the third world as you'd like to believe.

    Wouldn't be surprised.


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    #17
    wonderfulname
    Registered Users Posts: 3,943 ✭✭✭wonderfulname


    donegal11 wrote: »
    A cut of that 600m would go to salaries of admin and management for Irish based staff keeping them in the lifestyle they became used to, It doesn't all go to the third world as you'd like to believe.

    Back that up would you? And I don't mean by giving me concerns admin expenditure for last year I mean actually prove it, list where our overseas aid goes, who with and how its spent - all of it. Elaborate on how much those in employment in said organisations receive and then give a reasonable argument as to why this person is overpaid/why their job is unnecessary.

    Do that or gtfo, amazing the throwaway comments Irish people will make to justify letting other people suffer so they can keep a few cent in their pocket, and lets face it on a state level that's all the aid budget is.
    I bet those saying charity begins at home walk past a homeless man in this weather and justify ignoring him by assuming hes a junkie.


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    #18
    gurramok
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,992 ✭✭✭✭gurramok


    wonderfulname wrote: »
    I bet those saying charity begins at home walk past a homeless man in this weather and justify ignoring him by assuming hes a junkie.

    What a load of baloney. Never give money to a beggar, most are con artists including the foreign element. There is no way of knowing who is genuine or not. We give to Irish charities to take care of the genuine homeless in Ireland.


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    #19
    wonderfulname
    Registered Users Posts: 3,943 ✭✭✭wonderfulname


    gurramok wrote: »
    What a load of baloney. Never give money to a beggar, most are con artists including the foreign element. There is no way of knowing who is genuine or not. We give to Irish charities to take care of the genuine homeless in Ireland.

    Some are con artists.

    And there is a way, talk to them. Giving money to the simon community or similar is the best thing to do but f all people do, they just ignore the problem and make up bullsh1t excuses such as "most are con artists" to justify it. I never said hand them money, I never do myself, but I've bought a few cups of tea in this weather and I give money to the people who can do a proper job of helping them, I'm just wondering do the "charity begins at home" lot actually do anything or is it a means of justifying not helping those worse off.


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    #20
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 90,921 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    gurramok wrote: »
    How is what goes on in foreign countries my problem?

    They have governments to look after their own internal affairs.
    We had a government that was supposed to look after our own internal affairs. And they failed miserably. Thanks to the greed of a few people we are screwed. Our government has made the same mistakes that the 'third world' ones have with regard to borrowing cheap money in good times and spending it on white elephants, superfluous pubic jobs and tax reductions on wages.

    Corruption in Kenya maybe costs the government $4Bn a year, ( This is why aid goes through NGO's and local partners and not the government )
    our €80Bn is on top of everything that has already happened to us,

    I would consider a lot of our motorways white elephants as we could have got a decent public transport system for a fraction of the price. The M50 toll bridge epitomises the waste involved. The contract NTR got meant that a £30m bridge (in the middle of a pubic road that coast £300m) will cost nearly THREE times more than that Viaduct de Millau and we still have to pay the toll !!!!

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millau_Viaduct The bridge's construction cost up to €394 million http://www.examiner.ie/home/original-cost-of-m50-toll-bridge-unknown-126869.html
    Under the 2008 deal, the Government agreed to a staggered compensation package which, when added to 18 years of toll revenues, will ensure NTR earns €1,155,786,122 from the traffic-blighted carriageway by 2020.

    Looks like FAS are having major problems with FETEC now on top of our drop in the worldwide education ratings. Make no mistake we are a Banana Republic, possibly below Rwanda in the fight against corruption in the Brown Envelope / Who You Know sense.




    We are handing out €40m to AIB management , actually we are handing out €40m to AIB miss-management :mad::mad: When we should be telling those people that if they agree not to take the money then we won't investigate them for reckless trading. ( That is more than the cut in Development Aid )




    And again I'll point out that we are legally obliged to give aid, we are not legally obliged to bail out Anglo.




    The Choctaw Nation gave us aid at at time when they had problems of their own.


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    #21
    gurramok
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,992 ✭✭✭✭gurramok


    Capt'n Midnight wrote: »
    We had a government that was supposed to look after our own internal affairs. And they failed miserably. Thanks to the greed of a few people we are screwed. Our government has made the same mistakes that the 'third world' ones have with regard to borrowing cheap money in good times and spending it on white elephants, superfluous pubic jobs and tax reductions on wages.

    Corruption in Kenya maybe costs the government $4Bn a year, ( This is why aid goes through NGO's and local partners and not the government )
    our €80Bn is on top of everything that has already happened to us,

    I would consider a lot of our motorways white elephants as we could have got a decent public transport system for a fraction of the price. The M50 toll bridge epitomises the waste involved. The contract NTR got meant that a £30m bridge (in the middle of a pubic road that coast £300m) will cost nearly THREE times more than that Viaduct de Millau and we still have to pay the toll !!!!

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millau_Viaduct The bridge's construction cost up to €394 million http://www.examiner.ie/home/original-cost-of-m50-toll-bridge-unknown-126869.html

    Looks like FAS are having major problems with FETEC now on top of our drop in the worldwide education ratings. Make no mistake we are a Banana Republic, possibly below Rwanda in the fight against corruption in the Brown Envelope / Who You Know sense.

    We are handing out €40m to AIB management , actually we are handing out €40m to AIB miss-management :mad::mad: When we should be telling those people that if they agree not to take the money then we won't investigate them for reckless trading. ( That is more than the cut in Development Aid )

    And again I'll point out that we are legally obliged to give aid, we are not legally obliged to bail out Anglo.

    The Choctaw Nation gave us aid at at time when they had problems of their own.

    Yes, we have our own white elephants, doubt any Kenyan gives a sh1t.

    And since when would we care about the Kenyan govt's policies?


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    #22
    Slydice
    Registered Users Posts: 10,501 ✭✭✭✭Slydice


    You raise some very interesting points gurramok. Thanks :)

    I'm not sure why we would be particularly interested in the internal affairs of countries around the world. Yet, we seem to get very interested in many countries of all types whether they are rich, not rich or just plain poor. I'd say it'd be hard to do stuff like trade or give foreign aid with the world at the moment... without being interested in the fact that countries exist and that they have internal affairs.

    I think a lot of people think it is a big deal to give foreign aid. I'd guess that a lot of us really don't like the idea of people (especially children) starving to death. There's been a lot of images of famines from around the world and they definitly make me feel bad. I'd say others feel bad when they see them too.


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    #23
    djpbarry
    Registered Users Posts: 13,104 ✭✭✭✭djpbarry


    Johnny Utah wrote: »
    We are in dire straits...
    No we’re not. Pakistan is in dire straits. Haiti is in dire straits. Ireland is having a bit of a rough time at the moment, but it’s certainly not in dire straits.
    nhg wrote: »
    Charity has to begin at home... Home needs to be sorted out first before we are in a position to help others...
    “Home” will never be “sorted out”. Ever. There will always be poverty and other social ills such as addiction. All we can hope to do is minimise the impact of these problems. Suggesting that we should concentrate our efforts at “home” until all problems have been solved is effectively asserting that we should never provide overseas assistance ever again. But then, I think you knew that.
    gurramok wrote: »
    Yes, we have our own white elephants, doubt any Kenyan gives a sh1t.
    Given that Kenya is a member of the IMF, I’m pretty sure there is at least one Kenyan eyebrow raised at the prospect of pumping €85 billion into a relatively insignificant basket-case somewhere off the coast of Europe.


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    #24
    gurramok
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,992 ✭✭✭✭gurramok


    djpbarry wrote: »
    Given that Kenya is a member of the IMF, I’m pretty sure there is at least one Kenyan eyebrow raised at the prospect of pumping €85 billion into a relatively insignificant basket-case somewhere off the coast of Europe.

    Given that Kenya is constantly being rescued by the IMF and the World Bank, what is their contribution to the bailout here?


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