It was not exactly a surprise, but Tuesday’s federal budget confirmed rumours that the government would cut the aid budget as part of a raft of measures designed to balance the books and deliver a small surplus.
The size of the cuts was a surprise: $2.9 billion over the next four years, and a deferral of the government’s commitment to increase aid to 0.5 per cent of Gross National Income by 2015.
As Micah Challenge put it, this undermines progress toward the Millennium Development Goals, and represents a disregard for the concerns raised by thousands of Australians.
We know that aid works. If the government had kept its election commitment in full and on time, our aid programs would have saved an estimated 800,000 lives, and improved the quality of life for many more.
When a government tries to achieve a surplus on the back of the world’s poorest and most voiceless people, the result is a moral deficit.
Broadcast on 2CH Sydney, 13 May 2012.


