Charity should not end at home

WITH all due respects to your columnist Matt Cooper (‘Isn’t it time we got real about the cost of overseas development aid?’, October 22), to compare the very real suffering in Ireland caused by the economic catastrophe with the starvation and loss of life in the Third World is simply not to compare like with like.

To mention a few contrasts: the people of the Third World consider themselves fortunate if they get clean water out of a tap (so as to avoid the cholera which, for instance, is currently menacing Haiti); never mind bottled water.

They regard themselves as lucky if they learn to read and write: secondary or tertiary education is way beyond their means. And, to take the most basic comparison of all, the life expectancy at birth in sub-Saharan Africa averages 37 years whereas here the figure is 80.

Another set of comparisons is relevant. Just after World War II ended, the German population was close to starvation, while in Britain food was in such short supply that it had to be rationed. Nevertheless, following heated public debate, the British sent food supplies to Germany. And this year, overseas aid has been declared immune from the Cameron-Osborne cuts which apply to almost all other fields of public expenditure.

At the same time, I certainly agree with Matt Cooper that Irish people have always been notably generous to the Third World. It seems reasonable to deduce from this that the public would like the Government to be equally generous and to keep its promise to lift overseas aid to 0.7% of GNP by 2015.

I also agree that aid should be to assist the beneficiaries to reach a position where they can help themselves. And that NGOs should – as many of them do – observe the highest standards of openness and accountability in respect of the money they collect.

Certainly charity begins at home; but it should not end there.

Prof David Gwynn Morgan

Law Department

UCC