Thank you, Mr. Chair. That was an excellent job of describing it.
Yes, I guess I would be a colleague to Thomas here. We both play the same role. I'm parliamentary secretary to the minister, so I help out the minister of what we call CIDA, the Canadian International Development Agency--just basically what Thomas is talking about.
Absolutely, as most countries have, we've signed on to and we're committed to the millennium development goals and reaching them by the target date of 2015. We have set our targets on maybe not reaching the 0.7%, but increasing our aid in line with the OECD recommendations, as many other countries have.
We've had meetings with other countries that have said they are at 1% of GDP and then their next statement is that they're not sure the money is being spent wisely. So what we're focusing on is effective delivery of those dollars, rather than trying to reach that target too quickly and money being corrupted, going to the wrong place. That's what we're focusing on: effectiveness and accountability to our taxpayers in terms of where the money is going.