The Minister of State, Department for International Development (Andrew Stephenson)
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady) for securing a debate which is very timely, given some of the press reports. I hope that I shall be able to answer all his questions tonight, but before I do so, let me put on record a few of DFID’s greatest hits. First, let me acknowledge the incredible contribution made by those in DFID’s joint headquarters in East Kilbride, and by charities in Scotland such as the HALO Trust.
We should all be immensely proud of what our continued 0.7% commitment in legislation achieves. That commitment was shared by all—I emphasise the word “all”—parties in their manifestos at the recent general election, so the answer to the hon. Gentleman’s first question is a categoric “yes”. We are 100% committed to the 0.7% target throughout the current Parliament, and I cannot see that changing in any future manifesto.
The UK is, and will remain, a global champion for humanitarian relief and international development. Helping the world’s poorest is at the heart of what we do. Tackling the drivers of conflict, poverty, political instability and climate change is vital to the effectiveness of that work. In that regard, the aid budget is working in our national interest and the global interest, and keeping us safe here at home. Our aid spending is also catalysing growth across the developing world, removing barriers to trade, and, in doing so, helping countries to move away from their dependence on aid and become our trading partners of the future.
We know we must maximise the good that we do with what money we have, in the interests of those we are trying to help and to create direct positive results for the UK. DFID has strict processes in place to deliver even better value for money, so that UK aid is not misspent or diverted. This includes holding aid organisations to account by tying funding to performance, closing programmes that fail to meet development objectives and increasing efficiency savings. We also have a counter-fraud and whistleblowing unit with dedicated resources assigned to investigating the misappropriation of funds.
We all know that UK aid works. To list just a few results achieved since 2015: more than 14 million children have gained a decent education, of whom almost 6 million are girls; 3.9 million people have been supported to raise their incomes or to maintain or gain a better job or livelihood; and over the past eight years, UK international climate finance programmes have supported 57 million people to cope with the effects of climate change and enabled 26 million to have access to clean energy. The crucial support our aid programmes provide at times of humanitarian crises is something we should be proud of. More than 32 million people have been supported with humanitarian assistance since 2015, including at least 10 million women and girls.
At the UN climate action summit in September the Prime Minister committed to doubling the amount the UK spends on tackling climate change in developing countries to at least £11.6 billion from 2021 to 2025, making us the first country in the world to make a post-2020 climate finance pledge. The UK is also the largest contributor to major multilateral climate funds such as the Green Climate Fund and the Climate Investment Funds. DFID funds are helping to build the resilience of people and communities to cope with climate change, including natural disasters; to support the development of low carbon and climate-resilient infrastructure; and to support new technology, research and innovation to improve the effectiveness of action on climate change. Aberdeen virologist Dr Catherine Houlihan, who treated Ebola patients in the Democratic Republic of the Congo last year, has spoken about her belief that a vaccine developed with support from the UK has changed the path of this outbreak and saved thousands of lives. Most recently, UK aid efforts have focused on sending British medics to fight a deadly measles outbreak in Samoa over Christmas.
The UK is a world leader in preventing violence against women and girls. We are pioneering approaches around the world that have shown reductions in violence of around 50%, proving that violence against women and girls is preventable. The UK is also leading the way in tackling the illicit financial flows that enable global criminal gangs to operate. One UK aid project has supported African law enforcement officials to seize, confiscate or preserve over $76 million of illegal assets in 2017.
Advancing economic development in the world’s poorest countries is also fundamental to the UK’s international leadership. Investing in the growth of companies in Africa and south Asia creates the jobs and economic stability that lead to global security and help to end aid dependency. That is one of the reasons that we are hosting the UK-Africa investment summit, which has been mentioned in the debate, in which 21 African countries will come to London with the aim of helping to secure quality deals, create jobs and showcase the UK’s unique offer to Africa.
Life-changing progress comes from growth that transforms economies, creates productive jobs and private sector investment and spreads benefits and opportunities right across society. As we leave the European Union we will build on our strong record as a champion of trade and development. We aim to secure existing duty-free access to UK markets for the world’s poorest, and continue to support developing countries to reduce poverty through trade. Helping developing countries to harness the formidable power of trade means that we are not only creating trading partners of the future for UK businesses but supporting jobs here at home. Building a more prosperous world and supporting our own long-term economic security is firmly in all our interests.
UK scientists and cutting-edge technology are also at the forefront of global efforts, from developing new vaccines to wipe out disease, to transforming the way we do development. Diagnostic tests for TB, developed with UK aid, are now being used by the national health service. The skills gained by the UK’s emergency medical team in tackling diseases now benefit their work in the UK.
The way in which we achieve this is by harnessing all levers at the Government’s disposal. The UK aid strategy, published in 2015, signalled the need for a new whole-of-Government approach. This allowed us to draw on the complementary skills and expertise of all Government Departments to tackle today’s global challenges. For example, the UK’s response to the Ebola epidemic is made more effective by leveraging the health expertise at the Department for Health and Social Care and Public Health England, the logistical expertise at the Ministry of Defence, and DFID’s deep contextual knowledge.
Although we have made great progress in those examples, there is more to do. I am certain that right hon. and hon. Members across the House will agree that the challenges faced by developing nations are huge.
Where the UK considers the international aid rules to be outdated, we have in the past led the way in pushing for reforms. We have achieved some important reforms, including increasing the proportion of aid spending that contributes to United Nations peacekeeping operations and reducing restrictions to support countries affected by crises and natural disasters. We continue to challenge other nations to deliver on their commitments for a better and safer world.
Turning to another of the questions asked by the hon. Member for Glasgow North, we will stick to the OECD rules on aid spending. Our 0.7% will be fully compliant with those rules. However, I will not make a commitment that we will not seek to lobby for changes to be made to the rules, because we have done so in the past, for reasons that I hope the hon. Gentleman will agree were sensible.
Aid is an important part of Britain’s place in the world. As a Government we are committed to leading global efforts to tackle Ebola and malaria; to building on our existing efforts to end the preventable deaths of mothers, newborn babies and children by 2030; and to standing up for the right of every girl in the world to have 12 years of quality education.
During my time as a joint Minister—I was only appointed in July, after leaving the Whips Office, briefly via the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy—I have seen for myself DFID and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office working together to bring operations closer, to share expertise and to better co-ordinate responses to current and emerging challenges around the world.
The Prime Minister is responsible for all machinery of government changes, and he has not made any decisions on the future of DFID during this Parliament. The Conservative party manifesto sets out that we will proudly maintain our commitment to spending 0.7% of gross national income on development. The integrated defence, security and foreign policy review will create the opportunity to reimagine how the UK engages internationally in the context of global Britain. DFID and FCO teams work proactively in supporting this work.
As a country, we are at a pivotal moment. As we exit the EU, the UK will need to do more, not less, and we will need to become more outward looking. Our aid commitment increases Britain’s soft power and global influence. Leaving the EU has no impact on our commitment to supporting the world’s most vulnerable people. Nor does it mean that the UK and the EU should stop acting together to alleviate poverty and to tackle shared global challenges when it makes sense to do so.
Let me conclude by saying that by investing less than a penny from each pound of our income in aid, the UK is helping create a safer, healthier and more prosperous world.
Question put and agreed to.