Changing People’s Lives: From Delivering Aid to Ending Need
Istanbul Congress Centre, Turkey, 23rd May 2016
Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
“From Delivering Aid to Ending Need”. This is a powerful, and necessary, rallying call. It implies – indeed it demands – fundamental reform in the work of sustainable development and the practice of humanitarian action. It speaks to the need for coherent, collaborative and ethically grounded action at national and international levels – recognising that the necessary emergency response, while flexible and efficient, must lead to the empowerment of vulnerable communities over the longer term, through inclusive, culturally respectful, and gender equal institutions.
Fire-fighting must not impair, indeed must be part of, society building; to move from charity to solidarity, from responding to discrete crises to deep structural change, that surely must be our journey.
We must be focused in Istanbul on the needs of men, women and children who have endured suffering, deprivation, displacement, disappointment and abuse. We must have as a central concern the civilian casualties of conflicts. Let us take their reality, ideas and aspirations as our starting point.
For too long now, empty pledges and fine words have died in our mouths – now is the time to turn promises into action for this generation.
Ireland strongly supports the central thrust of the Secretary General’s report. In response, we will deepen our focus on forgotten crises and fragile states with targeted investment in state-building and peace-building. We will build on existing structures, strengthening national systems and local institutions. We will reinforce the role and resilience of states so they can provide for their own citizens, and reduce their dependency on foreign aid by building their own effective and just tax bases.
Ireland has prioritised a number of elements of resilience in its programmes – nutrition, gender and capacity to deal with disasters. We have had considerable success in these areas and the Secretary General's report now provides us with a comprehensive vision of how we should channel our efforts to deliver a shift from reaction to crises to building futures that are inclusive and sustainable. This is ultimately how the most fundamental trust – between State and citizen – can be rebuilt. In doing so, we recognise, however, that we must give a lead in promoting necessary reforms.
We must recognise that what is required of us all is a fundamental restructuring of our economic and development models – to models that are appropriate for preventing and addressing pressing humanitarian needs; models that will be empowering, gender proofed, sustainable and based on food security for all. Such a model must not be undermined by anything we do to enhance humanitarian capacity or response. They must rather be supportive of each other. Integrating emergency humanitarian responses with long-term sustainable development is possible, if made fully transparent.
It is my firm belief that we will only realise the goals of Agenda 2030, and in particular the goal of peaceful and inclusive societies, if we put people, especially the most vulnerable, front and centre in our deliberations and decision making. Ireland will promote humanitarian responses that are empowering, that put decisions into the hands of affected people; that helps to build strong communities; and that supports resilient and robust states.
We all share this fragile planet and thus we share the moral obligation to realise the full potential and dignity of all those who dwell on it. That can be our shared life and joy.
Thank you.
Leaders Statement, World Humanitarian Summit
Istanbul Congress Centre, Turkey, 23rd May 2016
It is the initiative of Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon which has gathered us all here in Istanbul. Through his report Agenda for Humanity, he has made a moving appeal, in the final year of his office, to the leaders of the world to turn words into action, to move beyond describing, again and again, the great suffering, the loss, the diminished lives of so many members of our shared human family.
I know that he is reflecting the views of so many on our fragile planet. As heads of State or Government, we must be aware of all those women, men and children who yearn for, even weep for, a United Nations that would be supported, resourced and enabled by its members beyond any competing set of narrow interests, to act decisively against the interrelated issues of global poverty and hunger, conflict, climate change and their ensuing displacement.
To achieve the changes which the Secretary General calls forth requires much more than any re-statement of aspirations. It requires a profound and integrated rethink of international politics, and of our theory and practice of economics, development and trade; it requires a reform of the representational structures of the world’s peoples; and indeed it demands little less, I suggest, than a new paradigm of thought and action, grounded in a reconciliation between ethics, economics, ecology and cultural diversity.
“Leaving no one behind” is the humanitarian imperative and the central commitment of the Sustainable Development Goals. It is also, rightly, one of the Secretary General’s five Core Responsibilities in his Agenda for Humanity.
For too long, empty pledges and fine words have died in our mouths – now is the time to turn promises into action for this generation.
So, let us honour those who have worked so hard to prevent, reduce and respond to conflicts, who have helped pick up the pieces in a broken world, but let us not shrink from the reality of the deep political and intellectual failures, with which we must deal, from which we must depart.
This is our opportunity to restore hope, to demonstrate the relevance of our multilateral system, our capacity and our courage. This is for us a moment of truth, a moral test.
Let us then not seek evasions. Let us strive to realise the great promise of security, prosperity and human flourishing that can flow from a comprehensive and positive shared global solution to the great challenges and the great opportunities of our times.
