The Minister of State, Department for International Development (Lord Bates) (Con)
My Lords, I join noble Lords in paying tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Loomba, for securing what has become an annual debate. He managed to put international widows on the agenda with the UN community by securing their own day. We recognise his contribution to achieving that and he is mirroring it in your Lordships’ House by putting this debate firmly on the agenda. We look forward to it and the issues that it raises.
It has been a wide-ranging debate and the noble Lord was right to begin, particularly at this time, by reminding us of the sexual exploitation and abuse allegations that have been made against some of our most important and respected charities. He summed it up perfectly when he talked about people in power abusing the powerless. That is exactly what has been going on, and that is what we need to ensure that we tackle.
My noble friend Lord Smith talked about the role that women can play in peace and security-building, the challenges of tackling practices such as FGM and the situation facing the Rohingya. The noble Lord, Lord McConnell, humanised the debate by bringing in some difficult encounters that he had had with young women in countries such as Liberia, Iraq and the Philippines. I was also grateful for his account from the Gambia, because it offered some hope for the future.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans reminded us of the important work which the church does in many such societies and gave the example of the Mothers’ Union. As we mark the centenary of women’s suffrage, he helpfully reminded us to remember with humility our journey towards gender equality in this country. The noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, drew our attention to women with disabilities and older women and the challenges which they face. Finally, the noble Lord, Lord Collins, rightly stated that we cannot limit our conversation about gender equality to sustainable development goal 5: it is integral to all the goals, and a challenge to us as to what more could be done in technical and vocational education and social and cultural change.
Gender equality is a top development priority and as such a priority for the UK. Achieving gender equality and empowerment of all girls and women is the right thing to do and is in our national interest. It is fundamental to building prosperous economies and peaceful and stable societies, and to achieving the sustainable development goals.
In recent decades, the world has made significant progress towards gender equality. However, as my noble friend Lord Smith reminded us, girls and women are disproportionately affected by poverty. Globally, 63 million girls are out of school; one in three women is subject to physical or sexual abuse in their lifetime; women make up only 23% of representatives in national parliaments; and nearly half of the 245 million widows worldwide are living in poverty. Again, I pay tribute to the work of the Loomba Foundation in advancing the cause and caring for widows in our society and around the world.
UK gender equality is providing leadership which drives global commitments and results. I recognise that this did not originate in 2017, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins, said: the UK has been consistently advocating such measures back to the days of Clare Short and the formation of the Department for International Development. In 2016, we initiated the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Women’s Economic Empowerment, which delivered unprecedented commitments from Governments, businesses and development institutions to give more women safer, more productive job opportunities. In 2017 we hosted a Family Planning Summit which secured global commitments to giving an additional 120 million women and girls access to modern contraception.
Since 2011, DfID’s work has been driven by our strategic vision for girls and women. Our work has been underpinned since 2014 by the UK’s International Development (Gender Equality) Act, which means that we mainstream the consideration of gender equality across all our programming. The results we have achieved through UK aid-funded programmes are making a difference.
DfID focuses on the areas which are the most critical for empowering the poorest women and girls: quality education and decent job prospects. Since 2011, UK aid has helped more than 5 million girls attend school and improved access to financial services for more than 36 million women in the poorest countries.
At the same time, we help tackle the barriers preventing women and girls achieving their potential. We know that women, particularly more vulnerable women such as widows, face more barriers than men to secure stable livelihoods because they are less likely to have education, training, property rights and access to the labour market. That is why, from 2015 to 2017, UK aid reached 9.8 million women with water, hygiene and sanitation programmes, enabling them to attend school or engage in economic activity where they once would have been prevented doing so by undertaking household chores such as collecting water.
The help we give women and girls to live free from all forms of violence and abuse so that they are safe in the home, at school and in the workplace is one reason why the recent allegations against those charities have had such a devastating impact on confidence—because preventing violence against women and girls has been so much at the core of what DfID and the UN agencies have been about. The fact that we should uncover these things happening in crisis situations is unforgivable.
I was asked by the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, what we would do at the 5 March meeting which we will be hosting for NGOs and charities, and whether we would co-operate with the two inquiries now under way by the Charity Commission and by the International Development Select Committee. Of course the answer to that is absolutely. We will make our own internal inquiries as well, as I mentioned earlier this week.
We strive to help the most vulnerable and marginalised women and girls at risk of being left behind, including widows, but also women with disabilities and those living in conflict and crisis. We are investing in improving even further our ability to reach the most marginalised. In order to know who is at risk of being left behind and why, DfID is investing in data which can be disaggregated on the basis of sex, age, disability status and geography, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, urged us to do. This will be very helpful in shaping programmes for the future. We are working with partners, including the UN and the World Bank, to improve gender statistics more generally, and are producing world-leading research and evidence on how best to support the most marginalised women and girls as a global public good. Through DfID’s research and innovation programme, What Works to Prevent Violence against Women and Girls, we have found that in South Sudan intimate partner violence is the most common form of violence experienced. Even during conflict, the most dangerous place for a woman can often be in her own home. That cannot be right; it must be the focus of our interventions.
UK world leadership on gender equality is a powerful feature of global Britain, with values at its core. UK public interest is at a high this year with celebrations of the centenary of many women’s suffrage here, to which the right reverend Prelate referred. In March, the Secretary of State will launch a new strategic vision for gender equality, and I will ensure that this debate is brought to the attention of the Secretary of State as we finalise the draft. This will set the agenda for stakeholders across the world, making sure that we all build on the gains that we have made and accelerate progress to make discrimination and inequality a thing of the past for all women and girls, leaving no one behind and paying particular attention to the most marginalised and vulnerable.
Let me turn to some of the specific questions I was asked. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked about sexual and reproductive health. In 2015, the UK made a commitment under Every Woman, Every Child that, in humanitarian crisis situations, DfID calls for proposals that require the sexual and reproductive health and rights of girls to be considered. That statement has already been made, and we stand very much by it.
The noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, asked about data disaggregation and whether it included older people. I think that I have already mentioned that it does—and more needs to be done. She asked a very specific question about the CSSF. I do not have the answer to that with me at the moment, but I shall certainly write to her on that matter. She also asked about the upper age limit of 49. Again, that is one that has just escaped the officials, so we will include that in writing, too. The Girls’ Education Challenge is a programme that we are immensely proud of, in the effect that it has had in getting some of the most disadvantaged and vulnerable girls into school—and keeping them there, because we know what a profound difference that makes to development. It is now in its transition phase, whereby we learn from what has happened and seek to improve on it in a future programme.
My noble friend Lord Smith and the noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked about the Rohingya. The UK recognises the plight of Rohingya women and girls, and has provided counselling and psychological support that will reach over 10,000 women suffering from the trauma of their experiences, and over 2,000 gender-based violence survivors. My noble friend also asked about FGM, and of course we had an international day on FGM just a week or two ago. We are the largest donor regarding FGM, with a flagship regional programme of £35 million over five years and an additional £12 million commitment on Sudan.
I repeat our gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Loomba, for securing this debate and thank noble Lords for their commitments. We shall ensure that this important work continues into the future.