Speaking at a Save the Children event at the Conservative party conference, the Chancellor reiterated the Government’s spending pledge and said support for it had grown in recent months.
Mr Osborne expressed his confidence that those in favour of the target were “winning the argument."
He told guests: “I remember seven or eight years ago when we first started making the argument about why the Conservative party needed to make the commitment to spend 0.7% of national income on international development…
“And for the first time I feel the argument is flowing in our direction.”
The public discourse, he suggested, had shifted as people began to understand that the aid budget does not just benefit some of the very poorest in the world, “but is also in Britain’s national interest.”
Mr Osborne cited two particular events that were crucial in “crystalising the change”, which were the Ebola outbreak and the Syrian refugee crisis.
During the outbreak of Ebola, he said, “If Britain had not been able to step in as we did, alongside the United States, and tackle the problem of Ebola in Sierra Leone, then it is perfectly reasonable to say that today that disease would still be raging in West Africa.”
“It was a truly national effort and it brought home to people the importance of the aid budget.”
On the conflict in Syria and the subsequent refugee crisis in Europe, he expressed his pride at “the ability of the British government to step in there with the Royal Navy, with our brilliant charities like Save the Children, and with our aid budget, to do our bit to try and alleviate the suffering of people fleeing for their lives and trying to do the best for their children.
“I think that started to shift the terms of the debate on our international aid commitment… I notice as a Chancellor of the Exchequer who has had to spend the last five years explaining this commitment, that I am not asked that question anymore, and that is something quite remarkable.”
Of the countries that made the commitment, the UK had been the first major economy in the world to keep its promise, the Chancellor added.
Chief Executive of Save the Children, Justin Forsyth, echoed Mr Osborne’s support for the 0.7% target and praised the Government’s response to the Syrian refugee crisis.
Describing the harrowing experience of a family that had fled conflict in the Middle East and attempted to reach Europe by boat, he said:
“They were rescued by HMS Bulwark, and the reason they were rescued by HMS Bulwark was because of a decision by the Prime Minister and the Chancellor to deploy some of our Royal Navy ships into the Mediterranean.”
Also speaking at the event was Education Secretary Nicky Morgan, who thanked Save the Children for their work on children’s literacy through the Read On. Get On campaign.
The initiative aims to ensure that every child is a confident reader by age 11, and identifies reading as one of the best routes out of poverty for some of the poorest children.
“Improving literacy is a social justice issue,” Ms Morgan said.
“If you can’t read or write or you are not numerate in the 21st century then you are shut out of an awful lot of things, including the opportunity to have a great education and to go on and fulfill your potential...”
Outlining the Government’s aims over the coming parliament, the Education Secretary added:
“Our ambition very simply is to make sure that our children in this country are the most literate in Europe by the time of the next election. I think that will be a great achievement.”