From Brian Coutanche.
ON 25 July you featured a letter from Gwen Tucker on overseas aid. She writes that ‘we should look after our own first and then, if there is anything left, we can give it away with good heart’.
Anyone who knows what it is to struggle to make ends meet and everyone concerned for the wellbeing of their fellow Islanders will respect the sincerity of the concerns underlying this view. It is a view that has been uppermost in the minds of at least some members of the Jersey Overseas Aid Commission and its predecessor the Jersey Overseas Aid Committee.
Yet some of those countries that are most generous in terms of overseas aid, for example Luxembourg or Norway, also have the lowest levels of domestic poverty, as measured by the UN Human Poverty Index.
Some of those countries that are least generous have relatively higher levels of poverty, for example Italy or the USA. There are exceptions: Ireland and the United Kingdom are relatively generous, but also have relatively high levels of poverty Nonetheless what these comparisons do demonstrate is that it is possible to ‘look after our own’ without compromising on aid.
So is the bottom line that Jersey cannot afford overseas aid? This view, expressed in the form ‘now is not the right time’, has dominated Jersey’s stance on overseas aid. Indeed, in the current recession it would seem to be self-evidently reasonable and prudent.
And this thinking appears to have guided the Council of Ministers in updating ‘our vision for the future’, the States of Jersey Strategic Plan. References to overseas aid previously included in the Strategic Plan 2006 to 2011 have all been removed.
But there are at least two difficulties with this stance. Firstly, both the Conservative Party and the Labour Party remain committed to reaching 0.7% GNI by 2013. If major UK political parties stand by such a commitment in the face of recession, then what prevents us contributing proportionately?
Secondly, Jersey’s aid budget has hardly moved since 1996 when it stood at around 0.17% of GNP. With hindsight it appears that the uncontested view that ‘now is not the right time’ prevailed even when circumstances may have been more favourable.
‘Charity begins at home’ and ‘now is not the right time’ both deflect attention from the central question. Jersey’s aid budget is ungenerous in comparison to other prosperous places. Because the international community has rallied around the Millennium goals, we have fallen even further behind.
As a community, are we comfortable with what that says about our identity and priorities?
