Media & Speeches

Federal Member for Fraser Bob McMullan, Federal Member for Canberra Annette Ellis and Senator for the ACT Kate Lundy have expressed their deep concern about apparent plans from Shadow Minister for Finance Senator Barnaby Joyce to take an axe to Canberra’s public service.

Speaking at the National Press Club in Canberra, Senator Joyce said that with respect to public service jobs it was essential to “control costs now”. Senator Joyce stated: “You’ve got to cut the suit to fit the wearer.”

Earlier today on ABC radio, Senator Joyce was asked what areas the money would be cut from to fund the Coalition’s climate change policy. 

He said:  “If you have a look at the, their explosion of their costings, for instance, in the public service.”

The ACT Labor representatives said they were concerned but not surprised to learn about Senator Joyce’s intentions.

“When the Howard Government took power in 1996, they took an axe to the public service in Canberra, cut tens of thousands of local jobs, and helped cause a local recession,” the ACT representatives said.

“It now seems clear that if an Abbott Government were elected later this year, Senator Joyce would be all too happy to do the same again.

“I think we stand for every local Canberra family in saying that Abbott and Joyce should come clean on how many ACT-based public service jobs they intend to cut.”

The ACT Labor representatives called upon ACT Liberal Senator Gary Humphries to speak out against Senator Joyce’s radical plans.

I have today advised the Prime Minister, the Australian Labor Party and my staff that I have decided not to contest the next general election.

I intend to continue as Parliamentary Secretary for International Development Assistance until the next election and the Prime Minister has advised me that he wishes me to do so.

This decision has been difficult.

I previously announced my intention to seek one more term. While I have found my engagement with international development assistance issues particularly satisfying and the local constituency work in Fraser both rewarding and enjoyable, I have concluded that I can make my best contribution to those issues to which I have dedicated my adult life by moving on while I am still fit, healthy and able to meet a new challenge.

The challenge of global poverty and global economic development is one which I hope to make the focus of the next stage of my life.

However, it is not appropriate to take any steps to seek opportunities in this area until I have completed my role as Member for Fraser and Parliamentary Secretary for International Development Assistance.

After the election Robin and I intend to take some long overdue holidays and then commence the process of starting the new stage in our lives.

I would like to thank the people of the ACT and the people of Fraser in particular for their support over the last twenty two years. I would also like to thank the hard working members of the Australian Labor Party who have supported me so ably over those years.

Without the support of my party and the electorate I could not have achieved any of the things I have been able to do during my career.

I will continue to serve the Government and the people of Fraser wholeheartedly and actively every day until the election.

The ACT branch of the Vietnam Veterans Federation will receive $7046 in funding from the Australian Government to support the health and wellbeing of the local ex-service community, the Member for Fraser, Bob McMullan, announced today.

Mr McMullan welcomed the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, Alan Griffin’s approval of the funding as part of the Australian Government’s Veteran & Community Grants program.

“Veteran & Community Grants provide on-the-ground funding for local projects that promote health and wellbeing in the veteran community,” Mr McMullan said.

“Projects funded through the grants program include initiatives that encourage veterans, war widows and widowers to learn new life skills to help them remain independent, as well as social activities and support for carers.”

This grant will contribute to the purchase of a new surface grinder machine for Vietnam Veterans Federation metal workshop.

Veteran & Community Grants are available to ex-service and community organisations, veteran representative groups and private organisations that contribute to the health and welfare of the veteran community.

“I congratulate the ACT Vietnam Veterans Federation on its good work, and this valuable initiative to support veterans in the ACT,” Mr McMullan said.

For more information on the Veteran & Community Grants program visit www.dva.gov.au/grants or contact the Department of Veterans’ Affairs office on 133 254 (for metro callers) or 1800 555 254 (for non-metro callers).

Federal Member for Fraser, Bob McMullan, has called on ACT Chief Minister Jon Stanhope and Federal Minister for Finance Lindsay Tanner to consider utilising available office space in Gunghalin as a way of easing pressure on the ACT construction industry.

Mr McMullan’s comments come in the wake of Mr Stanhope’s decision to delay ‘non urgent’ capital works in the ACT after the construction industry warned of critical skills shortages.

“I welcome the high level of capital investment in Canberra by the Rudd Government. This is contributing to Canberra’s strong economic growth and low unemployment.”

“However we have a situation where capital works, including construction of public service offices, are putting serious pressure on the ACT construction industry, and all the while there is 3000 square metres of fully furnished offices empty and gathering dust in Gunghalin.” Mr McMullan said.

“Not only does this space offer significant value for money for taxpayers, using it will also ease the pressure on the construction industry and provide a boost to Gunghalin’s economy.”

“In a situation where the ACT and Commonwealth governments are trying to reduce costs, this is an opportunity which is too good to be missed.”

Mr McMullan said he shared the Chief Minister’s belief in the need for long-term strategic planning for Commonwealth investment in ACT capital works to avoid peak and troughs and to provide better value for money.

“Obviously we need to figure out a better way of doing business in the future.”

Minister for Employment Participation Senator Mark Arbib and the Member for Fraser, Bob McMullan, today announced the second round of Innovation Fund projects that will help disadvantaged job seekers in Canberra.

The Australian Government has provided $700,000 for the “Home to Work” program which will offer counselling and employment assistance to the participants.

“This innovative project will support 80 long-term unemployed job seekers in gaining the skills needed to become job-ready,” Mr McMullan said.

“The ‘Home to Work’ project will integrate support services to ACT public housing tenants and include social networking activities through a ‘Jobs Club’, and culminate in work experience placements with local employers.”

The Innovation Fund provides $41 million for competitive grants over three years to encourage inventive employment and training solutions for disadvantaged job seekers.

Fourteen projects around Australia, totalling more than $6 million, will be funded in the second round. This is in addition to the $20.4 million announced by the Prime Minister in June for earlier projects taking the total to $26.5 million funding a total of 47 projects.

“The Government is committed to supporting disadvantaged job seekers increase their chances of finding sustainable employment,” Mr McMullan said.

“Already disadvantaged job seekers are receiving support and training to successfully obtain and keep employment through projects currently being undertaken from the first round of the Innovation Fund.”

As a component of Job Services Australia, the Innovation Fund projects lead the way in supporting people in areas with entrenched disadvantage, the homeless, people with mental health conditions, Indigenous job seekers and families with generational unemployment.

Further information on the round two Innovation Fund projects can be found at www.deewr.gov.au

A new strategy launched today will help poor people improve their way of life through increased access to crucial financial services, increasingly being seen as important to reducing poverty and achieving the Millennium Development Goals.

The Australian Government's Financial Services for the Poor: A strategy for the Australian aid program 2010-15 was launched today by Parliamentary Secretary for International Development Assistance, Mr Bob McMullan.

'As many as 2.7 billion adults in developing countries, or almost three-quarters of the adult population, still do not have access to financial services, such as savings, credit, payment services and insurance,' Mr McMullan said.

'Their inability to borrow or save money safely makes finding a way out of poverty more difficult and makes them more vulnerable when adversity hits.

'Financial services give poor people, especially women, opportunities to set up small businesses, insure against crop losses and save in case of illness or disaster. This has the potential to transform their lives.'

The Australian aid program has been spending an average of $10 million a year since 2004 to improve poor people's access to financial services and this will increase to up to $20 million a year by 2012-13.

Australia will assist formal and informal financial institutions to offer quality, affordable and fair financial services to the poor, including through microfinance and new technologies such as mobile phone banking.

Financial literacy programs will help clients understand the available services and make informed decisions so they can take advantage of financial opportunities and plan for the future.

Governments will be assisted to create a policy and regulatory environment that helps expand financial services while protecting consumers.

The Financial Services for the Poor: A strategy for the Australian aid program 2010-15 can be accessed at www.ausaid.gov.au.

(Check Against Delivery)
Acknowledgements

Thank you all for coming tonight to this discussion on ‘the power of small’.

I would like to extend a special welcome to Professor Muhammad Yunus.

Professor Yunus is in Australia at the invitation of Business for Millennium Development – an organisation that encourages the business sector to reduce poverty while doing business with the emerging markets of Asia and the Pacific.

Thank you for making time to come to Canberra.

In a moment I will hand over to Professor Yunus.

But first I’d like to set the scene for this discussion and then to launch the Australian aid program’s new ‘financial services for the poor’ strategy.

Over the past twenty years poverty levels in the Asia Pacific region have fallen dramatically.

In 1990 almost half the people in the region lived in extreme poverty.

Now it’s one-quarter – some 950 million people. This is still is a huge number, but a big drop nonetheless.

There are many reasons for the reduction but economic growth and a strong private sector have been critical.
Business creates employment and stimulates economic growth.

But in order to set up a business, you need access to basic financial services.

At present, about 2.7 billion adults in developing countries don’t have this access.

If they are subsistence farmers who sell surplus produce for a bit of extra cash, they don’t have the assets that banks require to lend them money.

Women are often not given loans because of rules and regulations that discriminate against them on gender grounds.

People with disability find it hard to get anything at all.

Business can directly target the poor in different ways.

It can do it through philanthropy or corporate social responsibility.

Alternatively there is ‘inclusive business’ where the aim is to generate profits and to deliver socially beneficial outcomes.

In this model, steps are taken to deliberately include poor people in the business cycle as employees, suppliers or distributors and as consumers.

Another way in which business can reduce poverty is through what is called ‘social business’.

These are businesses that have social outcomes as their main goal, not profit.

This is what you have come to hear Professor Yunus talk about so I won’t say any more about this.

The fact is that we need to engineer opportunities for those who are economically underprivileged.

One of the ways Australia is doing this it to help poor people in developing countries access financial services.

Through these services, poor people can set up small businesses, insure against crop losses and save in case of illness and disaster.

I am pleased to announce that by 2012-13 Australia will double our spending on financial services.

Our approach is outlined in the new Financial Services for the Poor Strategy, which I have the pleasure of launching right this evening.

The aid program will be working with financial institutions to offer quality, affordable and fair financial services to the poor.

We will be helping governments to create enabling policies and regulatory environments to support the changes needed to serve the interests of poor people.

And we will be providing funding for financial literacy programs to help clients understand their finances so that they can make informed decisions for their future.

This assistance will give people access to opportunities to transform their lives.

Today’s technology makes many things possible. Mobile phones and branchless banking give people in even the most remote areas access to financial services.

In the Pacific for example, Australia is working with a bank in Vanuatu to establish a satellite communications network powered by renewable energy that will bring rural branches online and provide full services to their communities.

Business in general has been a latecomer in efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.

Yet there is plenty that businesses can do to reduce poverty.

Professor Mohammad Yunus knows better than anyone the power of financial services for poor people and the impact business can have on reducing poverty.

Professor Yunus is a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and is known as a banker to the poor.

In the early 1980s against the advice of just about everyone, he set up Grameen- a bank which gives small loans to the poorest of the poor in Bangladesh.

The bank has a fundamental principle which is that credit is a basic human right and not the privilege of a few.

Grameen now provides micro-loans to more than two million families in Bangladesh.

Most of the loans are taken out by women and repayment rates are very high.

Professor Yunus is now also a strong advocate of ‘social business’.

Social business is cause-driven and its purpose is to achieve a social objective, rather than make personal profit.

Professor Yunus presents a compelling argument for social business as a viable poverty reduction tool.

Please welcome Professor Muhammad Yunus.

ends

Australia will provide $10 million over four years to improve marketing opportunities and boost agribusiness in the Pacific.

The Pacific Agribusiness Research and Development Initiative (PARDI) provides a platform for stronger economic growth of Pacific island countries. The initiative aims to substantially improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers in Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Fiji, with expansion into Tonga, Samoa and Kiribati.

Parliamentary Secretary for International Development Assistance, Bob McMullan made this announcement today at the Pacific Conference on the Human Face of the Global Economic Crisis being held in Vanuatu.

'The Pacific faces a number of challenges if it is to meet the Millennium Development Goals, particularly given the impacts of the global food crisis and more recent recession,' Mr McMullan said.

'This initiative makes it easier for farmers in the Pacific to get their products to markets. It enables them to be competitive players in the region, whilst ensuring their businesses are sustainable,' Mr McMullan said.

'The initiative incorporates commodity, supply chain, marketing and capacity-building initiatives to give farmers the skills and knowledge to enable Pacific agribusinesses to grow.'

The Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) initiative will be delivered through a partnership of Australian and Pacific island agencies including the Secretariat of the Pacific Community, the University of the South Pacific, national agricultural, forestry and marine departments in each country and National Agricultural Research Systems. Australian partners are the University of Queensland, Department of Employment, Economic Development and Innovation (Queensland), the University of Adelaide, University of the Sunshine Coast, James Cook University and Rural Solutions, SA.

Part of the Australian Government's international development assistance program, ACIAR helps identify problems and opportunities in developing countries, and commissions collaborative agricultural research between Australian and developing country researchers in fields where Australia has a special research competence. Visit www.aciar.gov.au

Australia is sending an initial shipment of emergency supplies to Santiago de Chile, on the next LAC Chile flight out of Sydney, currently scheduled for Saturday 6 March 2010.

The emergency supplies include 50 generators, 150 family tents and 1,060 collapsible field beds, all requested by the Government of Chile.

The supplies will arrive in Santiago and then be transported to the worst-affected areas around the city of Concepcion to provide temporary housing and power.

On 2 March 2010 the Foreign Minister, Stephen Smith announced an initial contribution of $1 million in emergency assistance and a further $4 million in reconstruction assistance to Chile after the devastating 8.8 magnitude earthquake struck on 27 February 2010.

The most recent situation reports indicate at least 2 million people affected, 500,000 homes destroyed and 802 deaths, with this figure still expected to rise.

Australia has also offered a team of structural engineers to support the Chilean Government to carry out damage assessments on public buildings and infrastructure affected by the earthquake, if required.

The priority at this stage is emergency assistance. We will continue to coordinate our efforts with the Chilean authorities, the United Nations and other Latin American countries.

PROOF ONLY

Subject: Australian support for the Global Fund, PNG’s application for Global Fund support, aid to Africa, Pacific Seasonal Worker’s Program

Donald: Mr McMullan, will Australia increase its contribution to the Global Fund in the next round?

McMullan: Well it still is a budget matter, there’s still a bit of discussion but we’re very positive about the role of the Global Fund and I told Professor Kazatchkine that he can rely on Australia as a strong supporter of the fund in the future.

Donald: So it is good enough for Australia to remain as the number sixteen donor or do you think Australia should do better?

McMullan: Well you’d expect him to say that wouldn’t you, and we will be strong supporters. We think the Global Fund is important, we want to see some reforms, but the Professor is in the process of implementing those and we expect to continue to be strong supporters of the Fund. It does important work globally and in our region.

Donald: How much more would you like Australia to be able to contribute, obviously you’ve got this commitment to increase our aid budget...

McMullan:...Even in a rapidly increasing aid environment, and that is where Australia is at the moment, you’ve still got to make choices. Every extra dollar we give to the global fund is a dollar we can’t give to some other important project. So it’s a hard balance to strike but we will do more there, it is an important organisation and we will stay active on its board and as a contributor.

Donald: [Professor Kazatchkine] had some things to say about aids in PNG. Obviously PNG’s application failed to be Global Fund last time around, the Global Fund wasn’t convinced it had the systems and the abilities to put a good program in place, what is Australia going to do to make sure PNG is more successful next time around?

McMullan: What we don’t want is to see the Global Fund reduce the rigor with which it scrutinises applications, even though it causes some difficulty in PNG it’s a good thing because it lifts the standard of what the systems and programs are like. So we are working with the Global Fund and the Government of PNG to lift the standard of their application, what is called a Round Eleven application, and the principle responsibility is with the Government of PNG, they are putting more resources in and we’re helping.

Donald: So AusAID has got officers there helping on the financials?

McMullan: Well the Australian Government has got some advisors, but it’s being led by the Government of PNG and they’re putting more resources in which is good. We’re pretty optimistic and you should know that we’ve already got that there will be what’s called a ‘Continuity of Service’ operation so people won’t lose their treatment but we need it to grow. That will need a new agreement and that’s where we are providing some assistance to the Government of PNG now.

Donald: So how confident are you that their application will be successful next time around.

McMullan: Well optimistic. We support the Fund being rigorous and not supporting applications that can’t guarantee to deliver value for money. We think we can get sufficient support for the Government of PNG with its leadership to deliver a value for money proposition but we haven’t got there yet.

Donald: On another issue, Australia has almost doubled its aid to Africa since Labor came to office, is this because Australia wants a seat on the UNSC.

McMullan: Absolutely not. I was involved in the first discussion with Kevin Rudd, when he was Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs, about how we would increase our aid to Africa long before anybody was talking about a UNSC bid. It’s because if you care about the MDGs, if you care about global poverty, if you care about people who don’t have enough to eat, you have to focus on Africa. And we won’t ever be a big player in Africa but we have an interest and a responsibility to be more actively engaged, we will go on increasing our aid to Africa up to and beyond any decision about whether we get elected to the UNSC. This will not stop in 2012, we have a commitment to continue to increase this support.

Donald: But is there a risk that Australia is spreading itself too thin by giving a little bit to Africa, a little bit here and there?

McMullan: We have to be careful about the effective management of it but my view is no, we’re not spreading ourselves too thin. We will be predominately an Asia-Pacific contributor, this is our strength, but we’ll try and work cooperatively. For example the big water initiative we are taking we’re doing jointly with the African Development Bank and the World Bank. The initiatives we are taking about food there we are doing cooperatively with some of the big international agricultural research agencies. We are working with already established efficient donors and we think we can do it efficiently and effectively as long as we don’t try and grow it too quickly.

Donald: It is multilateral aid in a way, it’s not bilateral?

McMullan: Well, for example, on a water project in Malawi we’re talking directly with the Government of Malawi but it is a triangular relationship with us, the Goverment of Malawi and the African Development Bank, and so far it is working in the interests of all three.

Donald: Just finally with the Pacific Workers Scheme, where is it at? There’s been some talk of PNG considering an MOU for 650 workers, are they coming or what’s happening?

McMullan: Two things are happening. One is the second round of workers have started to come in for this picking year, and the best thing is we’re starting to see some repeat workers, 20 workers from Tonga who came picking almonds in Robinvale have been invited back again by the same employer to do the same job, which is exactly what we want. The trial is starting to pick up a bit of momentum. We’ve always said from day one that PNG would be part of it and some of the potential is set aside for PNG, but they don’t have a background of sending workers like this and so we are having to do a bit more bureaucratic work to building it up. But we do expect in the course of this year or next workers to start coming from PNG.

-ends-

(Check Against Delivery)
Acknowledgements

Thank you for the invitation to speak at this meeting.

Economic crises are not new – they come and go. It’s how we respond, the policy choices we make and that we become more resilient with each new experience that matter.

Today I want to touch on a few themes that relate to the human face of the economic crisis.

I want to talk about the important issue of labour mobility and skill flow in the context of the development of people and economies.

I want to look at the economic progress that has been made in the Pacific.

And I will also touch on how small states can work more closely together to influence ways in which the international community approaches poverty reduction.

As this conference acknowledges, the past year or so has been tough on the Pacific – first with the high oil prices of 2008, then the global recession, followed by the tsunami in Samoa and Tonga.

These have combined to slow economic growth and progress towards the MDGs.

I congratulate Pacific island countries for resisting the temptation to pull back from integration with the global economy.

That would have been the worst thing countries could have done in responding to the crisis.

Countries that have done this have historically not fared well

It’s important that we take a long term view of what has happened.

Looking at the bigger picture, there have been some significant achievements over the past ten years.

Ten years ago hardly anyone in the Pacific had a mobile phone or internet access.

Now, mobile phones are widespread.

Here in Vanuatu over the past two years the proportion of the population with mobile phone access in Vanuatu increased from about one-quarter to three-quarters.

Another achievement has been a big decrease in the incidence of malaria in Vanuatu and Solomon Islands.

And reforms are making it easier to do business in several countries in the region.

These improvements not only contribute to greater economic development in general, they give people greater freedom to make choices and take advantage of opportunities that improve their lives.

They are necessary but not sufficient.

We need to take into account broader questions of history and geography.

Despite all the development assistance over recent decades, there can be no doubt that where we are born is the main thing that will determine our material well-being.

We can work and try as hard as we like but for most of us, where we live will have the greatest bearing on our individual economic prospects.

This is not an advocacy of despair or futility.

It is merely an insight into some further steps we need to consider to build resilience in the face of inevitable future economic challenges.

Because it is people who develop, not places.

Individuals develop when they receive an education and health services. We all develop when we have an income. And we develop when we have the freedom to use our skills and knowledge where opportunities present themselves.

More than ever, this century will be one of enormous movement of people and of skill flow.

We will be able to work in new and quite different ways.

Some of us may choose to live and work in another country permanently. Or we might find ourselves living in one country but working in another for set periods, or even working remotely.

People from the Pacific taking part in seasonal worker schemes have the advantage of working in Australia and New Zealand part of the year and being in their own country the remainder of the time.

This is exciting –we are lucky to be living in an age where transport and communications give us such flexibility.

To some extent these new ways of working should stop accusations of ‘brain drain’.

The term ‘brain drain’ has negative connotations and should be dropped.

It is far too simplistic to say that if an educated and skilled person leaves a country, the country is in some way dragged down by that loss.

The philosophical and economic arguments relating to the term ‘brain drain’ are complex and this is not the time or place to go into them in any depth.

However there are a few points that can be made.

The first is that many skilled people serve in their own countries for years before they emigrate.

The second is that if we limit or eliminate the chance for migration, we might also see a reduced investment and interest in education.

People’s education decisions are often shaped by opportunities for migration, even if not everyone ends up taking up that opportunity.

The Philippines is a good example. It has one of the world’s highest tertiary enrolment rates.

One reason is that a lot of people study nursing because nursing is a profession where they can get jobs in wealthier countries.

As it happens many nurses in the Philippines don’t end up emigrating – it’s the idea that they can that seems to motivate them to do tertiary education.

A third benefit is that when skilled people emigrate from one country to another there is more trade between the two countries.

And when skilled emigrants from poor countries go back home, they take back with them skills, savings and raised expectations along with an awareness of better functioning systems of government and service delivery.

Here in the Pacific we are all too well aware of the benefits which flow to countries of origin through remittances from temporary and permanent migrants.

Of course, migration is not the be all and end all to advancing development.

But greater mobility for workers across borders has the potential to massively increase people’s living standards.

Traditional thinking about poverty reduction does not generally link immigration with development policy.

It has tended to focus on aid, trade and removing international barriers on things that raise the productivity and living standards of people in lower income countries.

But there is a case for more debate about the role of immigration as a development tool - Australia is already taking small steps with the pilot seasonal workers program and by helping young people in the Pacific gain skills that might lead to jobs in other countries.

Young students from Kiribati are studying nursing in Australia. By next year about three thousand people will have trained at the Australia Pacific Technical College in areas where they are likely to find jobs in their own countries or abroad.

This increased emphasis on skills ties in nicely with the Pacer Plus trade agreement – an important part of the Plus is building up the capacity of the workforce to take advantage of the new trade arrangements.

And it complements efforts to increase business in the agricultural sector.

On this note, it is my pleasure to announce today a new program funded by the Australian Government to improve marketing opportunities for small farm holders here in Vanuatu and in several other Pacific countries.

The $10 million program will give farmers extra help to improve and expand their products, their supply chains and their marketing.

It will make it easier for them to get their products to markets and become more competitive in the region.

This program will be carried out by several research institutions and agencies in the Pacific and Australia and will be led by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research.

Improving food security and improving the livelihoods of people living in rural areas in the Pacific will help countries make greater progress towards the Millennium Development Goals.

I said at the outset I wanted to mention the Millennium Development Goals because these effectively represent the human face of development.

This year is a critical one for the UN and for the countries committed to the achievement of the MDGs because it’s an opportunity to leverage the change needed to reach the targets by 2015.

The MDG Leaders summit to be held in September will give us all a chance to take stock of progress and the challenges ahead.

It is an opportunity to ask whether the MDGs have been the right targets and goals and what will happen after 2015.

Most importantly, we will want to stop backsliding where it is occurring and accelerate progress where it is needed.

Australia will contribute our ideas, those we have learned from our experience as a bilateral donor and ideas that emerge from interested Australian groups and individuals.

However it’s critical that the views of developing countries be heard at the Summit.

This can be hard for some states, particularly the smaller states, but the world needs to hear from you.

Through the Pacific Islands Forum or Association of Small Island States, or both, you can present a common and independent position on the MDGs which will say something the rest of the world needs to hear.

You all know that small island states have some issues which differentiate their position from that of other developing countries.

It is a top priority for Australian in the lead up to the Summit to make sure your important viewpoint gets a fair hearing.

We will all be asking questions of the MDGs in coming years.

We will want to know the ways in which a common international agreement on aid and development has been useful, whether the structure of the MDGs should be replicated in the future or whether the context of the MDG framework has served the interests of developed and developing countries effectively.

There is a lot to discuss.

I want to finish on the note on which I began – throughout the global recession we have all sought to minimise the impact on individuals.

Social protection can do so much but improving access to reliable and quality services and increasing access to economic opportunity will do a lot more.

More than ever, donor assistance needs to be as effective as it can be – the Cairns Compact on strengthened donor coordination will help us achieve this.

I understand substantial progress has been made towards implementing the Compact since it was agreed by Leaders last year and that work is on track for key reviews and reports to be completed ahead of this year’s Forum here in Port Vila.

This is encouraging.

Although I will be retiring from politics this year, my interest in international development remains as strong as ever.

My intention is to do more work in this field, not less, and I relish that thought.

I have been interested in aid and development all my adult life and nothing will change that.

Thank you.

Bob talks to Alex Sloan about his recent trip to Africa