What I would do for international aid is have a department, be it DFID, or whoever. The only government money that would go into it would be the minimum necessary to pay the civil servants who run it.

The whole purpose of this department would be to coordinate the passage of monies to places that need it. The monies themselves would come from donations from the populace.

So, at the end of the month, you think you have a spare fiver, you can donate however much. You think you can afford a ton and want to, you put that much in. You think you don't want to send a single penny overseas, good for you.

Because this money is people's post tax income, it does not affect state spending. There is none of the moral issue of Cameron with Samcam's monies and his £150k wage, telling tax payers on a shedload less that 0.7% of all tax receipts should go to parts foreign with dodgy human rights abuses and no innate support for or love for the UK.

I think it immoral to pay aid to other whilst a single aspect of Britain is not operating at 100% efficiency. You think otherwise, you have the option to donate to save the children or buy a book from Oxfam, and let the state fix NHS/obesity/dementia/infrastructure etc etc.