That campaign, the focus of which is now the United Nations Millennium Plus 5 Summit taking place next week in New York, will see one of the most important international gatherings of the decade, drawing together world leaders and non-government organisations working on aid and development. Expectations are high. Some 150,000 Australians have been involved in the campaign, notable for its white wristband symbol and a concerted postcard campaign urging the Prime Minister to attend—he and the shadow minister for foreign affairs will, I understand, be present. The Make Poverty History campaign has at its core a demand for the wealthy nations of the world, of which Australia is one, to commit sufficient overseas aid to address the unacceptably high level of poverty holding back the development—material, social and political—of countries in Africa, the Asian region and beyond.

This campaign builds on the moderate achievements of the forgiveness of debt campaign which occurred under the debt relief banner during the 1990s. By 2000 there was sufficient international momentum to see Australia sign onto the UN Millennium Declaration. Yet, since then, we have had no specific, targeted program to address the Millennium Development Goals. These goals included the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, reducing child mortality and ensuring environmental sustainability, amongst others. In fact, aid levels have not sufficiently increased and priority areas like water sanitation still remain underfunded. While recent moderate increases in aid are acknowledged up to this point, if the Millennium Development Goals are to be reached it will require a genuine, increased and continuing commitment by Australia, with a specific plan in place, to reach the goals. Regrettably, at the present, this is not the case.

The United Nations Secretary-General has requested all donor nations to increase aid to 0.5 per cent of gross national income by 2009 and up to 0.7 per cent by 2015. At present, our figure languishes at 0.28 per cent in the 2005-06 projection. Australian aid as a proportion of gross national income had dropped significantly until quite recently. Even now it sits at only 1996 levels. This is clearly inadequate and falls well short of the global goal set by the Secretary-General which will be necessary to make a real impact on poverty.

This is not to say that the people endorse the government’s policy as reflected in these poor figures. It turns out that private citizens’ donations to aid and development non-government organisations have increased by nearly 10 per cent per annum since 2000—a terrific commitment by the Australian public. Nor, as it is sometimes claimed, is Australia’s overseas aid equivalent to the OECD average. What is clear is that Australians consistently show they are willing to help those less well off who live in adverse circumstances, but they would be disappointed if they knew where we rated in overseas aid. We rate at 16 out of 22—the bottom of the scale of OECD countries. Yes, the government has begun to address the issue of targeted assistance, governance and particularly the recurrent problems of some Pacific island states, but the bottom line is that the government still tends to exaggerate the level of its support. Critically, we are not delivering aid to the levels that (a) we can afford, (b) are comparable to other nations of our economic strength or (c) are desperately needed—especially in our neighbourhood of the Asian region.

Make Poverty History is a campaign that goes to the very core of what it means to be a global citizen in the 21st century, and in the next week the Prime Minister will have the opportunity to show that Australia is more than willing to play a constructive role. There are tangible, reasonable and profound improvements for the wellbeing—in many cases, the survival—of most of our close neighbours if we choose to increase our commitment to aid. The need is great and the call is loud. The call is to the Prime Minister: it is time to listen up and make poverty history.