Re: Overseas Aid

We may have to spend, to prevent more viruses.

Re: Overseas Aid

Bit of both I reckon. Always is really don't you think? There's always quid pro quo in everything I think. The number of strings attached to money given is usually a compromise between political influence sought or how much the competition is offering and what is demanded or expected by the receiver. For example the South Pacific Island nations get support from Australia and NZ and have done for decades. Now China is nosing around offering their "deals" - infrastructure projects in exchange for long leases or rights to build military bases - so Australia and NZ have increased pressure to match the offers blahblah. Other humanitarian aid is just that. Not enough strings sometimes - as you say.

Re: Overseas Aid

I just don’t know what we get from Pakistan .

Re: Overseas Aid

Actually, I think it's pretty obvious what we get from Pakistan!

In my opinion, we should be spending far less money on foreign aid. In most cases it is not appreciated and in many cases I'm sure it is misappropriated.

What I think we should do is, firstly, to seriously cut all foreign aid and use it only for individual instances of such things as disasters. By all means, use some for 'palm greasing' too if it is to our national benefit.

I was reading on Facebook today that we spend twice as much on foreign aid as we spend on our police service. If anyone's in need it's us, especially in our areas of high crime.

Re: Overseas Aid

Pakistan gives us some reasonable competition on the cricket field from time to time which has included some thorough thrashings ..Being a cricket tragic I find that pretty important. I know many won't. C'est la vie. On a personal level we have a Pakistani family who are close friends who we love dearly. Pakistan gave us them. But beyond that?..who knows. They are certainly no angels on the international stage but really who is? Well...New Zealand is as close as you can get to the model nation without being the richest by any means.Maybe they qualify? But this is one of my soapboxes. Rant time! In the broadest sense I have no problem whatsoever with giving foreign aid. Australia is a first world country and one of the richest nations on Earth. Despite the daily whinging and whining you hear about just about everything, most people have so little to complain about it is laughable compared to what some people in the world have to endure daily. Their power goes off for a day or two and you'd think they were in the middle of bombed out Syria. They have to wait a bit longer for road works and they're swearing at each other. While the islands in the South Pacific are sinking under water. I know many people here and the UK are very stoic also. And kind. Of course. BUt I don't resent foreign aid if it's administered properly. Same as I don't resent giving a homeless person a handout on the street from time to time. I don't want a bloody medal for it or a ticket into Heaven. It's just my choice.

Re: Overseas Aid

I know several Pakistani people and individually they are delightful and charming .
Unfortunately we have a lot of Islamists too.

This Pakistani journalist says its all our fault.

https://indianexpress.com/article/op...ttack-6256654/

Re: Overseas Aid

Well they are just bloody stupid too.

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Indeed. I have always maintained that there are good and bad in all cultures.

However, there can be no denying that the number of islamic terrorists is noticeably higher than terrorists of other religions.

As for whose fault? Yes. Ours, for letting so many in without the necessary checks. Now there are so many here, I think it's going to be an uphill struggle, if not impossible, to ever remove all the terrorists.

Re: Overseas Aid

100% political in my opinion. It is so the government has leverage when they want something from the country that has received UK financial aid.

A good example of this is India. For decades the UK has given millions in aid to India and back in 2011, India put out to tender to replace their ageing fighter jets. The UK is heavily invested in the Euro fighter and thus the UK government was supremely confident due to it's overseas aid ties with India that India would chose the Eurofighter as it's replacement. India chose a French made plane instead, the UK government were extremely angry.

Yet even still, the UK continues to give aid to India, a country that invests heavily in its own space program and military and thereby ignoring the impoverish conditions many of it's citizens live in.

Re: Overseas Aid

Hi

If you read the excellent link provided by Baz it shows where the money goes.

We are one of the highest donors of International Aid, far more than many richer Countries.

We do not pay for it out of Income, we borrow it.

It is considerably more than we pay to the EU.

A lot of it we give to the UN, we have no control over where that goes.

As for it's use in Trade Deals, that is a nonsense, look at the Bilateral Money, the bit we have direct control over.

No trade deals there.

We did not previously give so much, it shot up during the middle of Austerity and was enshrined in UK Law.

A Cameron folly.

Boris has decided to continue this.

I am not against Humanitarian Aid, natural disasters need a response.

We could still give to Humanitarian Disasters and hold our head up high.

They only amount for 15% of our donations.

We could double our expenditure on Flood Defences and still give an extra £3Billion a year to the NHS.

We have the worst NHS Emergency Waiting Lists on record, people waiting on trolleys in excess of 12 hours.

This is a nonsense.