Baroness Northover (LD)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, for initiating today’s debate and for his passionate and well informed introduction. I also welcome His Excellency the High Commissioner and others from the high commission who are interested in the debate today. The noble Lord, Lord McConnell, has a deep and long-standing interest in Malawi. He points out that there are particularly close links between Scotland and Malawi from David Livingstone onwards. He outlined very effectively how close those links are today. We have, of course, close links in the United Kingdom with other developing countries, often developed from a shared history, as in the case of a number of other African countries, and from diaspora links, as with Pakistan and Bangladesh.
The noble Lord, Lord McConnell, notes that Malawi celebrates 50 years of independence this year. In that time, it has achieved a significant reduction in child mortality, an increase in food production, free primary education for all and the establishment of a multi-party democracy, with a vibrant free press and civil society and a series of peaceful elections. Development assistance, including from the United Kingdom, has been critical but that is quite a series of achievements.
Yet, compared to some of its neighbours, Malawi’s progress has been slow. Average life expectancy at birth remains 55 years, 90% of people live without electricity, and only 28% of girls finish primary school. Landlocked and resource-constrained with a high population growth, Malawi continues to face the problem of lifting its people out of deeply entrenched poverty. Development assistance that addresses the underlying barriers to progress remains essential.
The recent multi-million “cashgate” corruption scandal, to which noble Lords have referred, in which it was discovered that significant amounts of public money had been stolen through systematic manipulation of the Government of Malawi’s public financial management system, was, and continues to be, of great concern to the UK. This money was stolen from the Malawian people, setting back much-needed poverty reduction. My noble friend Lord Steel and the noble Lord, Lord Collins, make extremely clear how significant this has been.
At the request of the Malawian Government, the UK funded—reference has been made to this—a forensic audit of government accounts to establish the extent of “cashgate” losses, the methodology used and those involved. Now the final report has been handed over, Malawi’s law enforcement agencies must continue to work methodically to bring the perpetrators of “cashgate” to account through the courts and deliver justice for the Malawian people. I assure the noble Lord, Lord Collins, that we are monitoring this very closely. The United Kingdom is committed to ensuring that every pound of UK aid money achieves its intended results and maintains a zero-tolerance approach to corruption. This is why, in concert with other donors, we took the decision to stop providing all financial aid to the Malawian Government in November 2013. There can be no consideration of putting UK funding through government financial systems in Malawi until the necessary actions to strengthen these systems have been taken and independently verified. We will keep this situation under review.
While we cannot work through government systems, the UK continues to work with Government and others for change in Malawi. The noble Lord, Lord McConnell, asked about capacity building to avoid future “cashgates”. The new Government of Malawi have committed to a greater degree of transparency and we will be working with them to take broader and sustainable action to tackle corruption and foster a culture of integrity in public life. As I have said, we are monitoring this very closely.
The noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked about meetings with Malawian Ministers. A Minister in the Foreign Office, my honourable friend James Duddridge, whom the noble Lord will know, met the Malawian Minister of Foreign Affairs at the United Nations General Assembly recently.
The United Kingdom remains one of Malawi’s major development partners but, as I said, is not routing that support through the Government. We continue to provide a large programme of support to reduce poverty and assist poor people across Malawi through other channels. I assure the noble Lord, Lord Collins, that we work hard to ensure that the poorest people do not suffer further as a result of “cashgate”.
I also note the projects that my noble friend Lord Steel mentioned. I hope that noble Lords will be reassured to know that in the financial year to March 2015, the United Kingdom is providing £61 million of bilateral support to the people of Malawi, representing 2% of its national income. That is complemented by the UK’s considerable contribution to Malawi through other channels, including the World Bank, the European Union—to which my noble friend Lord Steel paid tribute—the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, UK-based NGOs, and regional programmes. United Kingdom support creates educational opportunities for girls and boys, supplies life-saving drugs to the health sector, tackles undernutrition in young children and in people living with HIV, and provides vital inputs to farmers. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, mentioned several of those areas.
We are delivering significant demonstrable results for poor people. Since 2011, the United Kingdom has helped more than 350,000 women to access family planning services. By 2015, more than 400,000 women will have improved access to security and justice. By 2016, we will have ensured that 750,000 more people have access to safe, clean water. Our support enabled 5.2 million people to vote in recent general and local elections.
Those results are underpinned by important transformational changes: governance reforms, health systems improvement, transparency and accountability for citizens, and girls’ and women’s empowerment. We enable households and communities across Malawi to build resilience to climate change and chronic food insecurity. However, we are well aware of the need, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins, outlined, for people to have jobs. That is vital.
However, Malawi’s future needs to move beyond a heavy reliance on aid. Malawi must stimulate the creation of growth, markets, jobs and incomes for all its citizens, as the noble Lord pointed out. To that end, the UK is supporting Malawi’s economic development. We are working to improve the business-enabling environment, and the diversification and development of Malawi’s export market. We support smallholder farmers to diversify their production. We are helping to connect these farmers at local markets in Malawi to regional markets.
The new Government now have an opportunity to address the issues which have long held Malawi back from the most sustained growth and progress. They have an opportunity to set a strong vision for poverty reduction and to implement essential reforms to public financial management and the civil service, necessary to restore the confidence of the Malawian people and investors. I welcome those who are attending the debate today. They have an opportunity to rebalance the Malawian economy from one heavily supported by donors and reliant on the state to one more driven by private-sector investment and entrepreneurship.
The people of Malawi have seen past Governments promise much but fail to deliver. The new Government will want to show that they are different by working hard to deliver real change for all their citizens. This is what we want to see.
We welcome the first signs from the Government that they are serious. We welcome the civil service and public service reform commission, the President’s stated commitment to zero tolerance on corruption and the fiscal discipline prioritised in the recent budget.
The noble Lord, Lord McConnell—indeed all three noble Lords—flagged up the issue of visas. We are very keen for Malawians to be able to travel to the United Kingdom. We have alternative payment methods for those who do not have credit cards. This was an issue that was mentioned. Poorly paid people from Malawi are not discriminated against in applying for visas. There is no income threshold. I hope that it reassures noble Lords that 84% of applicants processed in Pretoria are successful. About 1,400 visas were issued last year.
The noble Lord, Lord McConnell, was critical of our online system. A recent IT upgrade has improved this capacity by about 33%. I will of course pass on to my colleagues in the Home Office the comments made in this debate. I note that there will be a future debate in the other place. I hope that I can also reassure noble Lords that these are areas that of course we will keep under review to balance the costs of our process and its purpose, and at the same time encourage visits.
We value our relationship with Malawi and Malawians. It is a country with such a bright future. We are closely engaged in trying to ensure that it can deliver that bright future for the people of Malawi, whose level of poverty has been made extremely clear in this debate.
The United Kingdom, which I am extremely glad also includes Scotland, has been a long-standing supporter of the people and communities in Malawi. While working hard to protect all UK taxpayers’ money, we will continue to provide much-needed continued assistance for sustained improvements in poor people’s lives.