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HOT ISSUE
Six NGOs ran an ad in The Independent thanking the Government for increasing funding to tackle world poverty. The Daily Mail hit out at these charities for using donors' money to 'hail Labour'.
YES Andrew Cook, head of marketing, Wateraid
The cost, £3,500 shared by the six NGOs (£583 each), rather than the £15,000 alleged in the Daily Mail, was well spent. The ad prompted a large amount of valuable positive coverage, including the International Herald Tribune, The Washington Times, ABC News Online and BBC Online. The big coverage in the US and Canada (more than 100 news outlets) will help to pressure those countries to follow the UK and France in setting a date for reaching the UN aid target. The letter also represented a good chance for us, as well as giving praise where praise is due, to push the Government further to deliver its promises on aid, trade and debtto help millions more of theworld'spoorestpeople.
Wateraid believes not only that we should support projects that deliver safe water directly, but also that governments, of everypersuasion, need to deliver on their commitments to halving the proportion of poor people without water and sanitation by 2015. Where the governments deliver, apublic acknowledgement can...