I would like first to thank Deputy Barry for sharing his time with me. I am very pleased to contribute on this debate which is a rarity in this House for exactly the reason this motion is down, that is, that there is no forum and there never has been in this Dáil, to raise issues and have debates. There is an opportunity here to raise questions and very often we have managed to get statements but what is missing is a facility for coherent debate, and for an exchange of views as Deputy Barry says, now and again in areas of consensus there has been no such forum for foreign affairs for Members of this House and of the Seanad. The structures in the Seanad over the years have allowed a little more flexibility in raising and debating issues of foreign affairs, although not satisfactorily. I am sure Deputy Higgins will outline that to the House. Nonetheless, Members have a slightly better chance in the Seanad of raising some of these issues.
To highlight how this House has been hampered in having any real debate, I refer to the statements here on 14 November when this House endeavoured to discuss the crucial issue of Ireland's role in the United Nations with regard to the situation in Cambodia and the continuing presence in the UN of a triumvirate containing the Khmer Rouge. Although the Minister agreed at that time to have the issue raised in this House, he would agree to have it raised only by way of statement, which meant there was no dialogue. He came into this House with a prepared script which he delivered at the end of a heartfelt debate from the Opposition side. It did not really matter what we said, the script was prepared and that was the way it was delivered, irrespective of the fact that there was consensus among all parties in Opposition and among his own backbenchers that this country should consider changing its vote at the UN. Sad to say, the Minister went as he came with his own opinion and did not listen to any expression of feeling from anybody else in this House. That is why I wholeheartedly support the motion here tonight.
Over the years there have been constant demands from various Members of this House — not just Members who are now in Opposition but from the Minister's side of the House, such as Deputy David Andrews, former Deputy Niall Andrews now an MEP, and Deputy Tom Kitt, all from Fianna Fáil — for this committee. I hope the Minister will listen to their cause and not feel threatened, as Deputy Barry says, by the setting up of such a committee. The existence of each committee will not be a threat to the Department's officials or to the Minister of the day. In the course of my work I have had the pleasure and honour of meeting many Deputies and Members of Parliament from Europe, including some from the Nordic countries, and from African countries. To my great embarrassment they all asked if I was there on behalf of the foreign affairs committee of my Parliament. I had to give a vague answer to the effect that I was the former chairperson of a committee of the House, but that that committee was no longer in existence. With some sense of shame, I have to admit that this House does not have a parliamentary committee on foreign affairs. I do not feel proud saying that. It is a disgrace that I have to do so considering the CVs of the Members of Parliament sitting on various committees. The first thing written in their CV is "Member of Foreign Affairs Committee", "Member of Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs" etc., but these words never appear against an Irish name. We have to hang our heads in shame.
The time has never been so ripe for this committee to be set up. In the last six months we have seen major changes throughout the world — in Eastern Europe, South Africa, Nicaragua recently and China — and these issues need to be discussed by Members of this House. It is not just for a few eccentric or way out Members of this House or of the Seanad to have to raise these issues. Since we do not have a foreign affairs committee very often those Members who dare to take an interest in these issues are maligned, belittled and considered to be out of touch with their constituents because they are dealing with issues outside Ireland. That is an insult to those Deputies and Senators who have tried to broaden the base on which we have been elected to this House and to educate the people that we are not here just to discuss the local telephone box, drains, sewers or whatever, but that we are have also to discuss Ireland's role in the wider world and the place we must take internationally. It is shameful that we have not such a committee.
In 1981 I had the pleasure and honour to be appointed and elected chairperson of the only committee in the history of this State set up by the Dáil and Seanad to deal with issues of foreign affairs outside Europe — the Joint Committee on Co-operation with Developing Countries. That committee was set up by Deputy Garret FitzGerald who had a very strong commitment to and interest in our relations with the developing world. The committee sat from 1981 until January 1987, when they were abolished by the incoming Fianna Fáil Government, again to their shame, showing their lack of concern and interest in this area. I acknowledge that they did not abolish the role of the Minister for Development Co-operation, and I am glad to see Deputy Sean Calleary here tonight in his role as Minister of State with responsibility for this area.
It is unbelievable that in 1987 the Government could have abolished the only forum that had been made available to Members of this House. It is widely recognised that that committee played a very dominant role in bringing to the forefront the relations this country has with the developing world. It was recognised that the committee were essential, that they raised the level of education and helped the non-governmental organisations and the Department officials to bring this issue to centre stage so that it would not always be considered the poor relation in the Department of Foreign Affairs.
Unfortunately, we have slipped back and my view is that the ODA programme has become once again the poor relation, in fact the forgotten relation. One only has to look at what happened in this year's budget. There was not a single line in the Minister's lengthy speech about our relations with developing countries, our ODA budget — nothing. Of course there was not a single line because he had not the courage to put one in. By stealth with one stroke of his pen he removed £1 million from our ODA budget. An Estimate was published in November 1989 providing an extra £1 million. Lo and behold, the Minister discovered he did not need that £1 million for the area it was intended. What did he do? He reabsorbed it into the Exchequer. Where did it go? We do not know. Was it given for the greyhounds or the horses? We still do not know. In a question to the Minister for Finance I could not elicit where that £1 million had gone, but one thing we do know, it was taken from the poorest people in the world. If we had a parliamentary committee on foreign affairs we would have been able to discuss such an issue, and perhaps put sufficient pressure on the Minister to restore that budget.
Since the abolition of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Development Co-operation we have seen the deterioration of this country's commitment to the Third World. It is interesting to note at this stage that in order to restore the ODA budget to the 1986 percentage of GNP, we would have to top it up by £23 million this year. That will show how much has been robbed from this Estimate and this budget. At the beginning of January that figure would have been £22 million but this £1 million which is being robbed in this year's budget brings the percentage down to the 0.25 per cent of GNP, the figure reached by Fine Gael-Labour Coalition in 1986. Instead we have seen the graph steadily falling. I quote what the then Deputy Michael O'Kennedy, Fianna Fáil spokesperson on Foreign Affairs said in Dáil Éireann in 1975, Official Report, column 1372, volume 278: "So far as this side of the House is concerned, we commit ourselves to ensuring that, irrespective of our budgetary or balance of payment problems, we shall set aside year after year the appropriate sum to ensure that we reach at least the target set by the Minister — 0.35 per cent of our GNP within five years", which would have been 1980. Here we are in 1990 and I defy anybody to say with any pride that aid as expressed as a percentage of GNP is 0.158 per cent. Shame on us all. Shame on every Member of this House that we were not able to convince the Government to bring that level up. Our level of aid is not in keeping with the views of people on the street. They give generously. Ireland was the highest donator to the Band Aid fund in 1985 for the people of Ethiopia. It is to our shame that our contribution stands lowest of all OECD countries.
Why can this issue not be raised more relevantly and more effectively in this House? The reason it cannot be raised is that the only mechanism open to me and others is through parliamentary questions where, with all due respects to the Chair, we get two or three minutes to ask the Minister supplementary questions. Then we have to move on to the next question. We have no committee on which we can tease out, coerce, cajole or seduce the Minister into recognising that there is unanimity on this issue in this House. I know the Minister of State opposite wants to see the budget increased but we have no forum on which to discuss it. When the committee I chaired for seven years were in existence we acted as a forum for all visiting dignitaries from outside the country. Many a day I got telephone calls from Members all over this House, from the now Government benches and the now Opposition benches asking me to call a meeting of the committee, albeit it informally, because some visiting dignitary or some leader of a country wished to talk to parliamentarians. The only way we could do it with pride was to call our committee together so that we were not meeting them for a cup of coffee in the bar. We were meeting them as elected politicians and we were able to discuss with them the issues that needed to be discussed. I was glad that committee were able to offer that kind of respect to this House. Shame on this Government for having abolished them.
I would like to stress another issue which follows on the motion before us. If a foreign affairs committee were set up I would like to see, as part of their standing orders, a statutory sub-committee to deal with our overseas development programme. I recognise that in the motion it is very specifically spelt out that we consider the Government's official development assistance to developing countries as well as other foreign policy issues. A separate overseas development committee is what I most wish for but I recognise that may not be practical and that there may be some advantages in combining our relations with the developing world with our relations in the wider world and drawing them together where there can be cohesiveness about both. However, having regard to the many foreign policy issues Members would wish to raise, I would like to ensure that any subcommittee set up would not just be for three or four months to deal with overseas development aid programme which would be pigeonholed and left there but that there would be a full-time sub-committee set up under the auspices of the main committee to ensure ongoing discussion.
In the course of the life of the last committee, we issued five reports, four of which I have been able to find: the Library could not locate the other. The first committee report that was issued was a full and frank resumé of our overseas development aid programme. I believe it is still being used in the Department of Foreign Affairs as a guide and reference document. I know it is also being used by many of the non-Governmental organisations and many of the voluntary groups working in this country to raise such issues. In my view it would have made an excellent White Paper which would have stamped a mark on our co-operation with developing countries. Unfortunately that report must simply remain in the Library as there is no forum in which it can be raised. We also carried out a study and issued a report on the effects of apartheid and of development in the southern African region, which is extremely topical at present in view of the changes that have commenced in South Africa and also of the effect of destabilisation in the southern African region. That was a very controversial report. In fact, this all-party committee made up of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Labour and Independents recommended the introduction of sanctions on the importation of fruit and vegetables from South Africa and the then Government implemented that recommendation. We can at least see that the committee were not an empty, vacuous body sitting for the sake of sitting and chatting for the sake of chatting. They were doing relevant work.
We also prepared a report on the issue of development education because without education and without a foreign affairs committee of this House the issues relevant to foreign policy will remain as fringe issues in which only a small group will be interested. I say to the Minister that the small group are growing and one has only to recall the Minister for Foreign Affairs telling us that he received 600 letters on the Cambodian issue. The Minister will get many more letters and indeed he has received many letters on the Government policy on overseas development aid. He will recognise that the public take an interest in our relations with foreign countries, in our relations with countries outside England and Europe. I hope he will begin to take note of what the people are saying to him.
The area of human rights is one a foreign affairs committee could usefully look at. I think there would be general consensus on the issue of human rights, but again we have no forum in which to discuss the issue. Over and over again Deputies have to use Private Notice Questions or the Adjournment debate to raise issues of human rights infringements. Just this week I met someone from Peru who gave me a very disturbing report — indeed there were two UN reports as well on the infringement of human rights in Peru, a country that we do not hear that much about. However, I have no opportunity to debate this and all I can do is table a question asking the Minister for Foreign Affairs to raise this issue at some forum in Europe where he can do so behind closed doors and nobody else in this House will know what he says or what kind of answer he may get. The issue of human rights has to be discussed in this House.
The more sensitive issues of Ireland's policy on neutrality, of relations with countries who have carried out atrocities or of relations with the Middle East, cannot be discussed in ways other than the ways I have outlined. With no disrespect to the Minister of State, it is a shame that the Minister, Deputy Collins, is not here. I recognise that he has many calls on his time and I know that the Minister of State, Deputy Calleary, will convey to him the urgent call to recognise that we are lowering ourselves in the eyes of our European partners and of the wider world when we do not have the opportunity in this House to discuss issues of foreign affairs. As Deputy Barry said, no Minister in Government should see a foreign affairs committee as a threat, that rather they should see it as an assistance a back-up and a goading to take on board the wishes of the Irish people on foreign affairs issues. I do not believe the Minister for Foreign Affairs would have gone to the United Nations last November and voted on our behalf the way he did on the issue of Cambodia if there had been an all-party committee of this House which would have recommended to him that we should have voted against any motion that sought to give succour or support to the Khmer Rouge. He could have gone to the United Nations with strength and conviction knowing that he had the support of the country, of this House and the Seanad in the line he took. Instead he went with his own opinion, perhaps the opinion we have stuck with generally because he did not feel confident that he could go with our opinion.
I would like to see this committee set up with all speed. I believe the Taoiseach has given an indication in this House that he, too, would like to see such a committee set up. One only has to ask when. The Taoiseach has been saying that he would love to have a foreign affairs committee and that he has no problem with it, but not now, and he waves his hand in his usual cavalier fashion and says: "Pipe down, all of you shouting for this committee, I will let you have it some day", as if he were entitled to deny this House the right to have a foreign affairs committee. It seems to be a question of "Lord, make me holy but not now".
I hope this motion commends itself to the House and that the Minister will give us the good news that the Government will support the establishment of a foreign affairs committee.