{"id":11775,"date":"2012-07-03T10:00:01","date_gmt":"2012-07-02T23:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/?p=11775"},"modified":"2012-06-25T12:43:30","modified_gmt":"2012-06-25T01:43:30","slug":"treasurer-replies-to-me-via-ausaid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/2012\/07\/03\/treasurer-replies-to-me-via-ausaid\/","title":{"rendered":"Treasurer replies to me via AusAID"},"content":{"rendered":"

In reply to my letter to the Treasurer<\/a>, the Honourable Wayne Swan, asking the Federal Government to keep their promise re Australia’s Aid, I received a letter from AusAid. It said in part with my comments [underlined]<\/em>:<\/span><\/p>\n

The Australian Government remains committed [but will it stay committed – it has broken its promise once?!-my comment<\/span><\/em>] to spending 0.5 per cent of Gross National Income (GNI) on official development assistance (ODA) and to playing its part in achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In 2012-2013, Australian overseas aid will increase to $5.2 billion, up from $4.8 billion in 2011-2012. This maintains overseas aid at 0.35 per cent of Australia’s GNI.<\/p>\n

In order to help achieve a budget surplus [there were other avenues available to achieve this, but it begs the broader question of why a budget surplus at the cost of\u00a0the lives of poorest of the world?<\/span>]<\/em>, the Government decided in the 2012-13 Budget to defer the achievement [“and we as the Federal Government acknowledge that we have broken a promise to the Australian people and we apologise sincerely to\u00a0them for this. We will not break this promise we make now” – How\u00a0helpful it would have been if the Government had made this apology?<\/span>]<\/em>\u00a0of providing 0.5 per cent of GNI as overseas aid by one year to 2016-2017. However, funding for overseas aid will continue to grow significantly over the next four years. By 2015-2016, Australian Aid will increase to $7.7 billion, equivalent to 0.45 per cent of GNI.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Read the whole letter here.<\/a>\u00a0 My letter to the Treasurer in April, Australia’s moral obligation to the poor<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I signed an open letter to the Prime Minister, 2 May:\u00a0“Australians Keep Their Word” -Rallying for Foreign Aid<\/a>.<\/p>\n

After the disappointing Federal Budget, the revised aid commitment, Global Aid Facts<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In reply to my letter to the Treasurer, the Honourable Wayne Swan, asking the Federal Government to keep their promise re Australia’s Aid, I received a letter from AusAid. It said in part with my comments [underlined]: The Australian Government … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11775"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11775"}],"version-history":[{"count":36,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11775\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11826,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11775\/revisions\/11826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}