BRIC's Float On UK Aid Money

The BRIC countries are those whose economies are considered to be some of the world's fastest-growing second world economies - China, India, Brazil and Russia ...... they have called for Russia (where the rule of law is non existent, as BP and many other companies have found to their cost), to be allowed into the World Trade Organisation (WTO), where no doubt like China, they will steal industrial secrets at a national level, and ignore all copyright laws. Oddly, South Africa, which is not one of the world's fastest-growing second world economies ... rather more third world in fact, has started attending these summits .... obviously there are 'geopolitical reasons' for this, but even seasoned pundits were unable to work out why.

However they are marked by one other common factor .... They nearly all are, or were until this year, recipients of foreign aid from the UK ... you can't make this up. We are actually helping to create the countries that will displace us in the world, while our own economy grinds through yet another major recession (what ever happened to the end of "Boom and Bust" in Britain?).

• China, India, and Russia all have bigger space programs than the UK
• China, India, and Russia are all nuclear weapons holders

In fact when you look at the UK's aid program generally its surprising who we give lots of money to:

Its interesting to note that:

• Misspending on the Military instead of their own people (Pakistan stands out in this regard, where education spending is pitiful, but military spending is huge - but Burma must also be a dubious aid recipient in this regard), is not a deterrent to UK taxes being passed over.
• Nor is rampant corruption (Pakistan has this as well), but virtually all these countries features at the wrong end of the world corruption index tables, and finally
• Democracy ..... most of the aid countries have very poor democracy and human rights records, but we reward them with aid money.

It seems to me that there is no coincidence in these facts, and that the West has got this issue utterly and fundamentally wrong  ... and that in fact we are giving aid for the wrong  criteria and we should only give aid to countries with:

• Good democracy records,
• Low levels of security spending, and
• High levels of Education / Health spending  

In other words as an encouragement to achieve the standards we want and a disincentive to acting badly .... the Corruption and Democracy Index tables should be the criteria for determining UK and Western Aid.