Danna Vale (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wish to inform the House that over 350 people from Holy Family Parish, Menai in my electorate signed a petition related to debt relief for developing countries. The petition has been forwarded to the Minister for Foreign Affairs.

This church has maintained a strong focus on the issue of debt relief for many years. In previous years the same number of people have sent postcards and signed petitions. For the past seven years they have invited expert speakers from both the Jubilee and TEAR organisations to raise awareness of the debt issue. It is truly uplifting to find such a group of people in a middle class suburb in Sydney who are concerned about the larger world.

The campaign for debt relief pursued by Holy Family Parish and the various NGOs finds its moral basis in the Old Testament of the Bible. There, citizens of the newly formed nation of Israel were told to regularly cancel debts of those who had fallen into hard times. The principle was that those indebted were to have the opportunity of a fresh start in life, unencumbered by the debt burden. This principle of practical justice and compassion is what underlies the bankruptcy laws of our nation. The petitioners of Holy Family Parish make the obvious point that such justice and compassion should be extended to nations as well as to individuals.

In June this year the social justice group comprised of parishioners of Holy Family Catholic Parish, Menai, invited Mr John McKinnon, the New South Wales coordinator of TEAR Australia—a Christian aid and development organisation—to address their congregation on Third World debt. Mr McKinnon not only highlighted the injustice of the world’s poorest nations paying money to the world’s richest nations but also spoke of the positive results achieved in Zambia and Tanzania as a result of debt relief already achieved.

Zambia, a moderately sized sub-Saharan country of over 10 million people, is one of the poorest in the world. Like many of its neighbours, it is plagued by unemployment, extreme poverty and disease. Today, Zambia’s major social indicators rank among the worst in Africa. Like many poor and heavily indebted countries, Zambia’s development and progress slowed and were worse during the 1990s than in any other previous decade. The average life expectancy in Zambia fell 15 years, from 54 years in 1990 to 39 years in 1999, before reaching 37 years in the period 2000 to 2005. The infant mortality rate increased slightly from 1990 to 1999, at a time of considerable improvement in such indices in other parts of the world.

Today Zambia has as much as 65 per cent of the population under the World Bank poverty line of a dollar a day. However, as a result of debt relief already granted to Zambia, the nation has been able to abolish health fees which, at between $5 and $10, were beyond most of the population. They were able to employ over 4,500 new teachers and 800 doctors and nurses. Change can come. Life can be improved for these suffering people. All it takes is for us in the privileged world to act with justice. The Australian government is to be congratulated for its part in this achievement through its involvement in the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative and the HIPC program.

However, as the petitioners point out, many countries are still saddled with unpayable debt that keeps their people in dire poverty. Even Australia’s near neighbours, Indonesia and the Philippines, have very large debt burdens. In Indonesia, the United Nations has estimated that expenditure on debt servicing is over seven times that on health and education. Indonesia is Australia’s largest bilateral debtor. The Indonesian government has requested that Australia offer debt relief. The Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade of this parliament recommended that Australia offer such debt relief.

Although neither Indonesia nor the Philippines fall inside current criteria for debt relief as defined by the Paris Club of bilateral creditors, some movement on this issue by the Australian government would be a magnificent gesture within our region and make a significant contribution to changing the lives of many impoverished people. There are various possible mechanisms, such as debt-for-development swaps, that would ensure the proceeds of such debt relief were spent on appropriate poverty reduction strategies.

It is an unfortunate fact that much of the debt owed by developing countries can be termed ‘odious’. If a despotic power incurs a debt not for the needs or in the interest of the state but to strengthen its despotic regime and to repress the population, then the debt is odious for the population of the state. For creditors to expect any protection in their loans to foreign states, their loans must be utilised for the needs and interests of the state. Otherwise, the loans belong to the power which contracted them and are therefore debts of the regime, not the state.

The lobby group Jubilee Australia estimate that up to 30 per cent of the debt owed by Indonesia and the Philippines falls into this category. It is fundamentally unjust that innocent citizens should bear the burden of servicing and repaying this debt when they receive no benefit at all. It is incumbent upon all members of the international creditor community, including Australia, to ensure that all such debt is cancelled immediately, whether multilateral or bilateral in nature. As a nation committed to giving others a fair go, we must do our fair share and all in our power and beyond to ensure that impoverished peoples around the world have the opportunity for a fresh start. (Time expired)