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Next Meeting
Friday June 13th
Cathie Roby will talk on her
recent trip to Bangladesh
with RMIT Social Work Student's
Study Group
Last November Cathie Roby went to Bangladesh around the same time as Beth did, however Cathie's trip was organized through RMIT and she toured different areas and visited different institutions. Cathie will talk and show slides of her experiences. Be sure to come and gain a further insight into this troubled country.
Winter Solstice Dinner
Saturday June 21st.
Eltham Lawn Bowls Centre
Also at the June meeting we will be finalizing all the details for the Winter Solstice Dinner. We will be calling for volunteers to set up the hall on Saturday and do such things as shopping for and preparing vegetables. We are also looking for more kitchen help on the night eg. Serving and dish washing. Some items of equipment, such as Microwave ovens are also still needed.
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"Why is our commitment to the poorest countries so paltry."
Pamela Bone in the Age 16.05.03
This is a synopsis of the article which had some useful statistics and a clear appeal to the community to act on the decline of foreign aid. Carole Wigg who prepared this item has the article if anyone would like to read it.
Pamela Bones points were:-
1) While the world was pre-occupied with Iraq, 40 million people in Africa were at risk of starving to death.
2) The head of the World Food Program asked "How is it that we routinely accept a level of suffering and hopelessness in Africa we would never accept in any other part of the world?"
3) The world is not stable or safe while such poverty exists,
4) Aid to Africa from Australia was slightly reduced in this year's budget. Since John Howard came to office it has gone down by 52.4% in real terms, funds to UN agencies that deliver aid have gone down 51.4% and funds to NGOs have gone down 35%. Though overall aid is up $79 million this year $48 million is to go to the Immigration Dept for refugees in Australia. Our aid budget is still only 0.25% of gross national income. (Defence is 2% of GDP)
She suggests that we should adopt the slogan of the recent peace marches "Not in our name" when criticising the meanness of our aid budget.
As well as reading this, I recently heard the end of a final part of a series on Radio National about NGOs. The conclusion seemed to be that the most effective thing that NGOs could do was lobbying governments. Did anyone hear more of the series? Should we be reconsidering Pollie Watch?
Dr Carole Wigg.
You can subscribe to pollie watch via email by visiting the Oxfam CAA web site.
http://www.caa.org.au/campaigns/network.html
We will discuss Carole's Suggestion at the next meeting regarding lobbying our politicians.
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