Some Thoughts on International Aid

At the time of year that I find myself bound for distant towns and cities to attend the biannual UNISON International Seminar, I realise that there are many things for which you can justifiably attack our government. They've run a sinking economy into the dirt, ostracised us from Europe and are still trying to introduce competition to the NHS so that they can create an insurance-based health system similar to the one in the US.

So yes, you can knock this coalition for many things, but on the matter of international aid, the coalition policy appears to remain steadfast. In fact, all three of the major political parties in the UK agree on at least one thing - namely, a firm commitment to meeting the United Nations target of 0.7% of each country's Gross National Product (GNP) being ringfenced for the purposes of international aid.

International aid, along with immigration, is one of those issues that makes policymakers twitchy. One cannot be too harsh on the subject without alienating the sections of one's electorate with personal and business connections abroad, but one also cannot be seen to be entirely in favour of aid without due cause, as this might risk losing the votes of those who don't understand why we appear to be gifting money to other nations - particularly when our own needy are growing needier by the day.

As international officers, how do we help people understand the necessity of international aid? Nationally, UNISON publishes the following advice to members. We know full well that our members in the UK are suffering greatly under the horrific mismanagement of our economy, but we also know that people join unions in a spirit of solidarity - when you need help most, all of us will stand behind you. Therefore members need to understand that while Britain is ailing from the effects of punishing and unnecessary austerity, workers in other nations are going through the same thing. It is only by building solidarity and cooperation that bypasses borders that we can hope to resist the massive neoliberal global attacks on our public services.

Let's establish a few facts. The actual amount that Britain spends annually is in the region of £8bn, or £137 per person per year. This equates to a little over 0.5% of our GNP, so if we are to meet our target, we'll have to find another few billion. It is worth mentioning that only a handful of Nordic and central European nations actually achieve the UN goal. The US, in comparison, gives a paltry 0.2% of its GNP in international aid each year.

What is aid used for? Ostensibly, the UN goal is that the money be redistributed from wealthy nations to poor ones in order to reduce poverty. That's a very noble goal, but also a very general one, and there are many better ways to use money than simply donating it to other nations. Just because we accept the notion that we should find this money and use it to alleviate suffering worldwide, there is still a debate about how that should best be done. We, as trade unionists, should be shaping the debate about how our money is spent.

We know better than most that the best use of a limited resource is to focus it in areas of great need. We know from experience that using the money within existing networks in local communities, asking them what they need and helping them to build their own organising capacity, is the most efficient model to use. To help us remember this, we use a time-honoured example: Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. Teach him to fish, and he will feed himself for a lifetime.

Critics of international aid argue that DFID (The UK's Department For International Development) is not transparent and that giving money to foreign governments creates dependency. We must be careful, certainly, that we don't simply create duplicate networks to those already used by governments and NGOs to carry out functions that should be performed by governments. We should also be concerned at the ways in which the money reaches the beneficiaries. By routing 40% of our spend through organisations such as the World Bank and the OECD, we risk creating political conditions on the recipients of aid, and thus potentially spreading neoliberal tendancies further throughout the world.

However, the concept of tied money is not a new one - and while it is ideal to meet the target without imposing conditions, we must also consider that foreign aid budgets are easier to sell politically if we can show that there are benefits to the UK too. DFID contracts are still awarded overwhelmingly to UK firms, and while not all trade unionists will agree with me, I believe that we can still improve relations with other nations, assist them in ways such as improving their infrastructure and benefit from cheap goods in return.

One of my fellow attendees here at the International Seminar suggested that we stop referring to international aid as aid. He has a very good point, and one that had previously been unmentioned by anyone else up to that point. Part of shaping the debate is controlling the language that is used (if you want evidence of this, note how the proposed forthcoming changes to council tax legislation are referred to as the 'bedroom tax' by opponents on the left, and the 'spare room subsidy' by supporters on the right) and by taking away the notion of 'aid' and replacing it with something that recognises the true role that it plays.

He suggested the Global Responsibility Allowance - a term that recognises the need to move away from seeing this money as something we own and give away, and more as a commitment to assisting the developing world with their own self-improvement, if not for its own end, at least in return for access to their markets. Whether this could be sold to the general public may be another matter - but it certainly couldn't hurt to try.

Model for a New Start

I've come to the conclusion that natural left-wingers, like myself, have reached their limit with the Labour Party. You may have read my previous treatise on a certain Mr Anthony Blair but the fact is that these suit-wearing sons of clergy and big business are no longer any more representative of the working man than I'm representative of Dutch clog-makers.

I also know people who would clearly fall within the remit of the traditional Tory voter who nonetheless baulk at the notion of supporting the good ship Camerlegg. We are all middle-class these days, and we know that it is no longer socially acceptable to sneer at people who we regard as being a step or two down the evolutionary scale. Furthermore, even if you're a worth a million pounds, you won't be buying a yacht or a house in Chelsea any time soon. It's no good having millions when the billionaires can soon price you out of any neighbourhood that they don't want your penny-pinching, hat-doffing type in.

What we have is a government of confusion and dissatisfaction, and we are not alone. In nations all across the world, the global debt crisis is seeing people move towards small-government, Conservative and nationalist agendas. In short, we are moving at speed towards the interests of those very people whose self-interested machinations started the crisis in the first place.

It seems that when it starts to get cold, sheep will choose to desert their lazy, careless shepherds and instead make their way to the warmth of the slaughterhouse. You only have to look across the pond to where US President Barack Obama has had to make a deal with the Tea Party Republicans that effectively sees the American economy driven over a cliff while Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich laugh maniacally from behind the wheel. So do you vote for the lunatics, or the people who have no choice but to pander to them?

Can it really be so hard to appeal to voters with a bit of common sense and some simple statistics to explain what you are doing in government and why? I wonder sometimes if our own civil service is not so used to spinning inconvenient truths that it has lost sight of what the purpose of government really is. People in the UK feel that there is no-one in government that supports the way they feel and even that government itself cannot be trusted. Private sector and public sector workers wrestle frantically with each other for crumbs while the faceless representatives of multinational corporations drink Cristal champagne and ignore them.

So what can we do?

I feel the time has come for a clean slate. We need to do away completely with the restrictive tags of Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democrat. All of us hold views on separate issues that fit across the political spectrum, and we are now faced with nightmarish concepts like Blue Labour, or Green Socialism, etc. It's time to pick some new names and write a manifesto for the laymen.

Modern politicians primarily come through a small select number of education establishments and this gives rise to a feeling among the rest of us that politicians do not understand their own constituents.

The particular kind of political 'inbreeding' that I alluded to earlier means that we tend to be led by a people from a narrow range of backgrounds and with an extremely limited exposure to a range of human experiences. It is time that our Lords were abolished and our Commons became truly representative. A representative government should include all minority groups, regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexual persuasion, and so on. Critically, it should contain a representative number of MPs from comprehensive school backgrounds and there should be also be a representative number of disabled MPs too.

Next, any MPs who were involved in the MPs expenses scandal should be debarred from Government. For example, our friend from yesterday, Oliver Letwin, claimed £2000 in Parliamentary expenses to repair a leaky pipe under his tennis court. The argument that this was allowable under the rules at the time completely misses the point. In order to be respected by those who elect it, a government has to strictly regulate its own behaviour. Only then will people believe that they can trust government to act in the best interests of the nation at large, and the public perception of a self-perpetuating 'old boys network' can then be quashed.

Donations to political parties should be strictly limited to small amounts (say £20,000 per year) and should all be declared publicly and published in the mainstream media. All parties with a seat in the House of Commons would be guaranteed a set number of hours of TV time for their election campaigns, and no more than this could be purchased. Transparency of political activity should become the accepted norm.

Taxation needs to be reviewed from the top down by government and corporation tax is ripe for an overhaul. It is disgusting that companies such as Barclays have been able to get away with paying the equivalent of 1% corporation tax on their vast profits. A pound earned in Britain should mean tax paid to Britain. The stated aim of reviewing taxation should be the reduction of inequality, with the need for redistribution of wealth above a certain limit, to be decided by the new Parliament.

Economic policy would look towards the creation of real economic growth through productivity and wage increases at the low end, and we should be looking to once again develop a production industry. We cannot cut interest rates any further as a means to stimulate borrowing, and this is inadvisable strategy anyway as it has led to the asset price bubbles that are partly responsible for the economic mess we are in. Neither can the ridiculous plans for austerity measures at this time be continued. Cutting spending and reducing taxes in the UK have done nothing to promote growth, and demand for products and services is lessening as a result. In the long-term, economic market sustainability with planned growth rather than the boom-bust effect is of course our goal.

Foreign policy would link to social policy with regard to the creation of sustainable energy as a massive priority, so the need to involve ourselves in foreign conflicts and our reliance on the likes of the US and Russia could be reduced. We would utilise our existing budgets and the money saved by reducing troop numbers stationed abroad to explore ways in which we could make genuine contributions to improving life in other parts of the world. We should aim to be involved in building and social development projects rather than simply lending out or giving vast sums to other countries.

Immigration policy also needs to be reviewed, with the aim of creation of a policy that reflects the value that immigrants bring to society rather than Daily Mail-induced hysteria. This is not a suggestion that the doors of the UK should be flung open to anyone who wishes to be here, but there should be honest, open debate where those who have genuine concerns about the integration of communities are allowed to have their say as well as representatives of ethnic minority groups themselves. This reduces the risk of the issue being hijacked by the 'us vs them' politics of the odious far-right movement.

Most importantly of all, government needs to be accountable to people and I suggest a reduction in the period between general elections to three years, with compulsory referendums on major national policy issues. There would be no more under-the-radar changes to the NHS.

Okay, there we go. I've had my say; now it's your turn.

Getting the Message

One week to go before election day! If I wasn't such a stiff-upper-lipped type, there's the chance that I might just have weed myself with excitement. Tonight sees the last of the televised leaders debates but there have been two pieces of news in the political spectrum - the first that anyone British will have had to have spent the last 24 hours under a rock to miss, and the second which has been slipped under the radar in most of the mainstream press, which is a shame, because it's much funnier than the first.

The Bigot of Rochdale has of course dominated the news, with Gordon Brown's ill-timed vent about a widow concerned with immigration being caught on a Sky News microphone. It is clear Mr Brown is not keen on face-to-face contact with voters and finds the touchy-feely approach of this campaign uncomfortable to say the least. But then, not all great men are people people. As long as he can keep the economy stable, I'm with...oh.

In a hilarious event which has been mostly skipped in the press as a result of Bigotgate, Nick Griffin will be in the High Court today defending the BNP's use of Marmite in election campaign material. Like the love-it-or-hate-it yeast extract product, voter opinion is torn on Mr Griffin, but with an opportunity to get his party's central policy as the focus of national discussion, a genuine bigot will instead be in the dock defending a vigorous legal action from Unilever. Oh, irony, thou art more delicious than Marmite.