Michael Johnson (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to speak on this important motion on microcredit moved by the member for Franklin and I want to acknowledge in the House that he is one member of parliament who has enormous respect and regard across the chamber. He is certainly a man of great heart and compassion, and this House will be the poorer on his departure from the parliament when the election is upon us.

The motion is really about eradicating global poverty. The world has some six billion people in it today, and over half that number, some three billion people, still live in abject, desperate poverty on less than $US1 per day. It is incumbent upon all of us in countries as privileged as Australia to do all we can to tackle the scourge of global poverty. That means trying to get clean drinking water to people who do not have it and trying to put food in the bowls of those people living in remote corners of the globe who do not have access to a good meal each day.

The Howard government is very much a supporter of tools to tackle global poverty such as microcredit. We do it in a number of ways. Our aid budget is one very significant way in which the Australian government tackles issues of global poverty, in particular poverty in our region. Australia will provide some $3.2 billion in official development assistance in the 2007-08 year, an increase over last year’s budget, which was $3 billion. You can always say that more can be done and you can always ask for more money and better ways of doing things, but this country—and certainly this government—is doing all it can to tackle the big issues that face us as a country and as a people.

The government, as I said, does support microfinance as an effective tool for reducing poverty and has invested an average of $10 million a year over the last eight years in direct support to microfinance. The Australian government’s white paper on overseas aid programs is very much focused on accelerating economic growth and supporting local communities to connect with private sector led rural and business development, which microfinance is very much a part of. We should continue to invest in a microfinance approach, which is specific to the people and customers it aims to help and to the unique market environment, particularly here in the Pacific. It provides support where the establishment of local financial services is most likely to deliver long-term results and meaningful outcomes, as opposed to the short-term results that aid programs usually provide. We have to try and focus on long-term solutions and on connecting people to a more sustainable recovery model. That is one of the great assets of microcredit as a tool.

Australia was, of course, represented at the Global Microcredit Summit in Canada in November 2006. This was a very important event and confirmed that some 100 million poor people are borrowers. We want to try to increase that number. The summit launched a new target of 175 million people in developing countries by 2015. Australian aid will continue to be part of the reach of microfinance, and I strongly support that. Expenditure on microfinance is expected to be some $10 million for the 2007-08 year. As I said, we can always do more. I understand this figure is not set in stone; we can increase that in conjunction with further discussions with the governments of the countries that we are trying to reach out to. (Time expired)

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