I wish to share time with Deputy Sargent.
The point I was making before the debate on the Bill adjourned was that Ireland is the fourth wealthiest nation in the world. We have a responsibility and a duty to ensure we set a standard and, at the very least, that we achieve the target set by the UN of 0.7% of GDP in terms of development aid. We are not meeting that target or setting an example, which is a pity especially this year when we had the opportunity with the EU Presidency to set that example. Other countries in the EU have met and exceeded that target. We need to do so but, at the very least, we should achieve the target set by Dóchas and Development Co-operation Ireland. We call on the Government to end its totally unjustifiable three year freeze on overseas development aid spending levels and to immediately start to implement targets which have been agreed and which it stated it would achieve by 2007. We need a renewed commitment to achieve that target.
We live in a world in which 50 countries are poorer now than they were in 1990. That is an indictment of the western world in particular. We live in a world in which an elite few have more money than they can possibly spend in a lifetime, yet one in five people survive rather than live on less than €1 a day. In 20 countries, more than one person in four goes hungry, that is, one quarter of the population. In 700 other countries, one quarter of children do not live beyond the age of five. In nine countries in this small world, one person in four still does not have access to safe water.
It would cost $100 billion to cut global poverty by half by 2015, the same amount spent by the United States on its war in Iraq. The war in Iraq is not over and the United States will continue to spend and waste more money instead of targeting global poverty. In 2002, indebted countries made a net transfer of twice that amount in payments to the wealthy nations. At present states spend only half the needed amount on development aid, preferring to lavish $800 billion a year building and deploying their armies. That is a scandalous figure. In the modern western world, building and deploying armies around the world is more important than tackling poverty. Four years into the new millennium, military spending continues to dwarf spending on development aid at a global level and in the EU. Even in this State, whose Government prides itself on being a leading donor country, our military spending is increasing.
With the so-called "war on terror" and the plan to build an EU army, starting with a common armaments policy, we are pushing ever further in that warped direction. We believe that the international community must get its priorities right. Up to now, it has got them dead wrong. What must guide international relations policy in the future united Ireland is the objective of achieving human security. That human security concept recognises that the most deadly weapons of mass destruction are hunger, poverty, disease, death, inequality, dependence, dominance, exploitation, dictatorship, state clientelism, torture, abuse and other systematic sources of suffering. Those are the real threats and sources of insecurity for the vast majority on the planet.
That is why we assert that the fulfilment of the UN millennium development goals, which aim to cut global poverty by half by 2015, should be elevated to a top international spending and policy priority. Their achievement will contribute more to global security than the so-called "war on terror" that is cannibalising budgets and resources internationally. We have long known the steps required. Now we have the millennium development goals, a set of eight concrete steps, shared goals and matching targets which we believe chart out our future progress and commitment. We must reach and exceed those goals.
I urge that, in the short time left of Ireland's EU Presidency, the Minister for Finance, Deputy McCreevy, and the Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs with special responsibility for overseas development and human rights, Deputy Kitt, should report to this House and debate this State's implementation of the Barcelona commitments and the Government's plan to play its part in achieving the millennium development goals. Government time must also periodically be made available to allow Ministers to report to the full House on what is being done in the name of the Irish people at other international fora and financial institutions such as the World Trade Organisation. I ask the Minister to respond to that and I hope that we will have more regular debates on whether we are achieving those goals.