European Union (Amendment) Bill

I agree with my hon. Friend and I hope that the Minister took those points on board. Let me revert to the possibility that the European high commissioner would have charge of the aid budget. Several of my hon. Friends have mentioned the ever-increasing centralisation of decision making, with a few people at the top having ever- larger empires, for want of a better word, over which they would have exclusive control. We have noted that for several years the European budget has not been signed off, yet greater centralisation of funds will lead to the inevitable prospect of those funds, ever approaching the pinnacle, not being subject to as much accountability as we would like—in other words, the money will not go specifically to the people for whom it is intended It is therefore important that there should be a specific European commissioner in charge who can be held responsible for the money and can try to follow where it goes—to which countries, to which projects and to which people. We are discussing this important issue in the comfort of the Palace of Westminster. Many in the Chamber have had their evening meal and others know full well that they will soon be able to have theirs. However, I am reminded of the occasion on which, as the recipient of a fellowship from the Norfolk charitable trust, an organisation run by Tom Harrison and his daughter Deborah Harrison, I visited Ethiopia to see the starving for myself. I will never forget the occasion when—[Interruption.] Labour Members may well jest about the poverty and the dying in Ethiopia, but I assure them that their criticisms of our compassion are highlighted by the humour that they find in my comments about the dying and the starving in Ethiopia. I will never forget the occasion on which I went to a feeding centre, where hundreds of people were squatting, waiting for a bag of grain, a pot of oil and a little bit of salt, which was to last them for the next month. This debate is about those people. It is about their next meal. We must recognise that this is not just another issue. We as politicians have a responsibility, in a global world, to our global brethren. It is therefore vital that where there is aid money, it is properly targeted and properly dealt with, and that there is proper accountability. By accepting the amendment that my hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh has moved, we will ensure that our duty towards the starving of the world will be that much better fulfilled. If we do not accept the amendment, I am afraid that we as politicians do an injustice to all our rhetoric and an injustice to all the people who look to us for their next meal. To conclude, when my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough said that the Government had not yet said that our amendments were wrecking amendments, the Minister said that he had not had an opportunity to do so. The Minister is an honourable Minister and I have an enormous amount of respect for what he says and what he does. I therefore very much hope that his comments were made in jest, and that he will not stand at the Dispatch Box and try to rubbish the well-meaning amendments that we have tabled. I urge the House to put aside party politics and accept our amendments, which are for the greater good of mankind.