foreign aid

Bob Geldof was recently invited to Australia to talk about world poverty. His fee was £100,000 - and of course he flew first class. It was one small chapter in the story of an industry whose gross earnings put it fifth behind the world's largest economies - the aid industry.

The issue has dramatically entered the news again, with the earthquakes in Haiti and Chile and the continuing drama of Darfur. It confronts you every day as the charming young "chuggers", with their umbrellas and yellow jackets, deliver their charity scripts with a smile.

Real humanitarian aid would include:

•An end to occupation

•Aid without conditions

•Borders open to refugees

•Cancellation of all debt

•Funding of public and community associations

•Free elections

•Repayment of colonial "reparations", interest and penalty payments

Haiti coverage in this month's Socialist Review:

Haiti - the making of a catastrophe, by Mike Gonzalez

The numbers are almost incomprehensible, the devastation and loss impossible to imagine. At least 100,000 people lie dead under the rubble, and 2 million are homeless and abandoned. The news footage of whirring helicopters and aircraft carriers outside the ruined ports created a mirage of action - but as the days passed nothing changed in the devastated slums of Port-au-Prince.