AS I am heading back to Afghanistan, next week to oversee my own humanitarian aid projects, I read with particular interest David Pratt’s astute article on the aid industry (“Aid workers shouldn’t think that they are above criticism”, The Herald, March 19), and Bob Geldof’s outburst over comments on the BBC World Service that, perhaps, not all the money from Live Aid made it to the sharp end.
I was surprised by Geldof’s intemperate reaction to the BBC’s excellent World Service, given that most people in the aid industry are aware that the delivery of aid to remote, conflict or disaster areas of the world is extremely difficult, dangerous and open to many different forms of corruption.Therefore it is vitally important that we are honest and transparent with our donors as to what they can expect for their money. When people are desperate they will resort to fair means and foul to survive. That comes with the territory.My own, small, aid agency, Spirit Aid, is very proud of the fact that we have only lost a 50kilo bag of beans and one of maize in eight years of operations in countries as diverse as Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, South Africa and Malawi.That achievement is only possible with very carefully, hand picked, local trustees, regular “hands on” visits from headquarters and a thorough and transparent accounting system.
Like David Pratt, I too have witnessed, countless times, the tragedy of completely inappropriate aid being delivered to desperate communities such as boxes and boxes of hair gel destined for refugee camps in Kosovo or huge piles of warm, winter clothing lying rotting in the humid docks of Colombo after the Tsunami,.This is more the mistake of lack of research than obvious corruption.
But more importantly, I believe, that the “corruption” begins at home. I long for investigative journalists to concentrate on the fact that seven CEOs of aid organisations in the UK are paid more than £240,000 per year and that a further 70 CEO’s earn over £120,000 pounds per year. Try explaining that to the pensioner who hands you a fiver out of the goodness of their heart because they wish to help people less fortunate than themselves.
I appreciate that large aid organisations that operate around the world need experienced, professional management but if we allow the moral corruption of inflated egos and even more inflated salaries that are deemed to be above criticism then we are neglecting the very people we are in existence to help.
David Hayman,
Spirit Aid, 133-135 Stockwell Street, Glasgow.
Contrary to David Pratt’s assertion Christian Aid welcomes scrutiny of its work at home and overseas. Accountability is core to Christian Aid’s beliefs. Indeed, we were recently named top non-governmental performer in the Global Accountability Report.
However, we do ask in return for accurate reporting from the media, which should not be too much to ask. Far from “jockeying for position in Haiti” for example, we had one press officer on the ground who fielded calls from journalists crying out for interviews. Had our press officer not been answering calls from 6am until midnight, our hard working national staff dealing with their own private grief would have had even less time to deal with the practical rebuilding of their country. There was not a hint of “self-righteous indignation” among our staff whose own office collapsed and who, that very night, went out to help the injured.
As for Ethiopia, the BBC programme in question is not an example of the investigative journalism David Pratt is so keen on. In the documentary, a disgruntled former Tigrayan rebel, Gebremedhin Araya, alleged that during the famine in the mid-1980s he disguised himself as a grain merchant and convinced Max Peberdy of Christian Aid to hand over $2 million “cash in hand” which was later diverted to the rebel fight.
In fact, Mr Peberdy’s entire grain purchasing mission was only worth $500,000 and the transaction in question just $60,000. This money was used to buy food, which was checked. Araya claims that half the sacks of grain were actually filled with sand. It is clearly preposterous to claim that Christian Aid was sold 150 tonnes of sand and nobody noticed.
Then as now, Christian Aid was mindful of how aid can go missing, and took every precaution to prevent that happening.
The BBC documentary left the impression that some 95 per cent of aid money sent to the region in 1985 failed to reach famine victims. These damaging allegations were based largely on questionable sources, and were unsupported by evidence. That is why Christian Aid is making a formal complaint to the BBC Trust.
For the record, the transactions in which Max Peberdy took part were in 1984, long before Band Aid or Live Aid.
Kathy Galloway,
Head of Christian Aid Scotland, The Pentagon Centre, 36 Washington Street, Glasgow.
Fastlink could be constructed without massive disruption
Your front page story (“City boost as Salmond backs £40m tram link”, March 19) needs some clarification. Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) are the long-term sponsors of the project and are working with our partners Glasgow City Council to deliver it.
Firstly it needs to be made clear given the hullabaloo about the Edinburgh tram project that Fastlink is not a tram. Fastlink is a “bus rapid transport” project. A bus is not a tram or a tram on tyres. It is a bus, albeit a rapid and high quality one. The advantage of such a system is that Fastlink, if it were to be funded, could be constructed without the massive disruption associated with having to move underground utilities (gas, electricity telephone lines etc).
Secondly, SPT’s vision for Fastlink looked at a system which would run on the north bank of the Clyde to the SECC and Glasgow Harbour and potentially as far west as Clydebank and also to the east end of Glasgow; from the city centre it would run to the Southern General hospital and beyond potentially as far as Braehead and Renfrew. The full extent of that system cannot be delivered at the cost of the £40m quoted in the article.
That said it should be made clear that SPT and the City Council have had no guarantees of funding for the project from Transport Scotland or the Scottish Government at this stage, although reports of part funding of £40m are encouraging, if unconfirmed.
Finally the fact that we have not been informed yet about funding should not be interpreted negatively, especially given previous assurances made in parliament about Fastlink funding by the Finance Secretary. SPT and Glasgow City Council are now in the final stages of completing the outline business case which will be submitted to government in due course.
Councillor David Fagan,
Vice Chair SPT, Consort House,
12 West George Street, Glasgow.
Regarding the possible expansion of the Glasgow Subway as a means of increasing its usefulness to the city, I believe that its north to south alignment beneath the city centre is one of its major assets, complementary to the west to east alignments of the Central Low Level and Queen Street Low Level underground lines. For many years now, there have been plans to convert the Cathcart Circle group of suburban lines, which operate southwards from Central Station, to light rail, and the present need to re-equip the Subway would seem to be the right time to consider linking up the Subway with these Scotrail routes.
Conversion of these “heavy” rail routes to light rail and a link with the present Subway, for example by a new and relatively short tunnel section between West Street Subway station and Pollokshields East Scotrail station, would provide cross-city travel opportunities which would do much to revitalise both rail systems.
As the Garl fiasco has demonstrated, piecemeal planning is not enough. We need a city-wide vision of public transport, as well as a country-wide system such as would be provided by Crossrail, and an expanded Subway must have a part to play.
John Hamilton,
5/5, 1 Barrland Court, Glasgow.
The SNP must stop taking Scotch whisky for granted and work in partnership
Letters attacking John Beard of Whyte & Mackay are a sign of how desperate the government has become in seeking to push through a minimum pricing policy on which it has failed to come clean, and a sign of how little regard the SNP has for Scotland’s leading indigenous industry (“The Scottish Parliament has been treated with contempt over alcohol pricing issue”, The Herald, March 19).
The government has ducked and dived to avoid stating what minimum price it would introduce while modelling the impact of minimum pricing as high as 70p a unit, yet it dismisses Mr Beard for using 50p, the very figure the Government’s own Chief Medical Officer has called for, and on which the Scottish Government consultation sought comment.
On the legal issues, the government refuses to state how it will overcome 30 years of clear jurisprudence from Europe ruling minimum pricing to be illegal. Its own modelling work reports that international research shows moderate drinkers are the ones most likely to reduce their drinking, not the heaviest drinkers.
The SNP has consistently attacked UK tax policy as a bad example to other countries of how to tax Scotch whisky, yet ignores the inconvenient truth that governments abroad will use a Scottish override of international trade rules to introduce barriers damaging to Scotch Whisky. It is the strict application of these trade rules to date that has lead to the global success of Scotch and the benefits this has brought to the wider Scottish economy.
There is an opportunity for consensus. There is much support across industry and politics for a ban on sales below cost, possibly through a transparent mechanism of no sales below duty and VAT, together with backing for most of the other proposals in the Government’s Alcohol Bill. The SNP through concentrating on minimum pricing undermines that opportunity for consensus.
The SNP needs to stop taking Scotch whisky for granted, realise the value of this national asset -- no other industry has invested more in Scotland in recent years -- and work in partnership to find legal mechanisms and culture changing initiatives for the long term health of the country.
Solving Scotland’s problem with alcohol misuse is a cause behind which we should be able to all rally.
Campbell Evans,
Director of Government and
Consumer Affairs, The Scotch
Whisky Association,
20 Atholl Crescent, Edinburgh.
Wolfe’s commitment to Scottish CND
The obituary in today’s Herald for Billy Wolfe makes no mention at all of a vital aspect of his life -- his total commitment to Scottish CND.
He in fact served with conspicuous dedication for many years on the executive of SCND. He also actively supported the campaign of NVDA (non-violent direct action) which Trident Ploughshares maintains against Trident.
His integrity and honesty are ironically underlined by the very same edition of the Herald (“UK launches global nuclear safety drive”), where we read in an article by Michael Settle, that Gordon Brown “stressed that both countries (France and Britain) would retain their independent nuclear deterrents”
He really means the criminal and illegal nuclear Weapon of Mass Destruction Trident, but doesn’t want to speak the truth. Just the sort of cant that Billy could never stomach.
For a long time Billy saw clearly what is now surely blindingly obvious to all -- the direct causal link between nuclear
weapons, and Scotland’s abject and subservient role in the British state. Billy will indeed be sorely missed, but his struggle for peace and independence goes on.
Brian M Quail,
2 Hyndland Avenue, Glasgow.
Failures that are the root causes of disasters such as Stockline have still not been fully addresssed
Your report on the response of the UK government to the Gill Inquiry on ICL Plastics (“New safety measures announced in wake of Stockline” , The Herald, March 19) raises some intriguing points and begs answers to important questions. Efforts to improve gas safety are to be welcomed. However, unless the root causes of such disasters are addressed they will continue to occur.
Those root causes include: failures by some employers to protect employees with basic health and safety standards and working conditions ; failures of government to ensure effective and properly resourced health and safety agencies and effective health and safety laws both to protect employees and to ensure justice is seen to be done for those killed in the workplace; failures of the Health and Safety Executive over many years to maintain an effective level of law enforcement; failures of courts to thoroughly investigate the financial background of employers who commit such crimes to ensure financial penalties are effective; failures of courts to thoroughly investigate the accurate financial state of employers who commit such crimes to ensure financial penalties are effective.
Why have these failures not been fully addressed and when will they be? We have seen the enormous damage done by the lack of effective regulation in the banking and financial sector.
We tend to lose sight of the enormous toll taken each year -- tens of thousands of lives lost through diseases and injuries -- due to poor workplace health and safety conditions and regulation. These are not trivial but shocking figures.
Professor Andrew Watterson. University of Stirling, Jim McCourt, University of Stirling, Dr Dave Whyte, University of Liverpool, (members of the ICL Stockline Study Group, c/o The Occupational and Environmental Health Research Group, Room 3T11, RG Bomont Building, University of Stirling.
Having worked in financial services for many years, I consider myself lucky to have escaped. I do, however, still have many friends in the banking sector -- HBOS, Royal Bank of Scotland and Santander.
They all say the same - they are told - it’s “business as usual”i.e. sales, sales, sales. This generally means trying to sell loans to people who cannot afford them or
persuading risk-averse customers to put their hard-earned cash into inappropriate investments.
Until management at all levels realises these dubious practices need to cease, the banks will never change.
Jacqui Mair ,
19 Murchland Way, Irvine.
Rabies fears are overstated
Your report (“Scots scientists in rabies warning”, The Herald, March 19) may be unnecessarily alarming for the British public. The article is based on concerns raised by researchers at Biobest Laboratories who have a commercial interest in continuing rabies serology testing. The views should therefore be approached with caution.
The veterinary profession has been working very closely with Defra to ensure any future changes to the current pet travel rules do not pose a substantial risk to the health of both humans and animals in the UK. There has been a significant reduction in the incidence of rabies on mainland Europe over the past 20 years, thanks to a highly successful vaccination programme. Under the proposed changes to the rules, which would harmonise the UK with the rest of Europe, animals would still receive the rabies vaccine so we would retain that major control measure.
The European Parliament voted last week to extend the current arrangements, which afford the UK and four other Member States stricter control measures, until the end of 2011. We believe this provides the UK with a window of opportunity to carry out the necessary scientific research on the impact of harmonisation.
Professor Bill Reilly,
President, British Veterinary Association,
7 Mansfield Street, London.
