Development Aid Budget

Baroness Jenkin of Kennington Excerpts

Monday 3rd July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jenkin of Kennington (Con)]

My Lords, imagine my disappointment on arriving in the Chamber today to find that, due either to technical incapability on my part or to a malfunction of the machine in the Whips’ Office, I was not on the list to speak after all. I am very grateful for the opportunity to speak briefly in the gap so forgive me for darting about a little bit with slash, slash, slash—it is not all that easy.

I join the noble Baroness, Lady Tonge and the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, in focusing some of my remarks—I make no apology for this—on the value of access to contraception and family planning programmes as a way to break the cycle of poverty. By empowering women to plan their futures and reach their fullest potential, voluntary family planning gives women and girls the opportunity to complete their education and take up better economic opportunities. We know that it transforms lives, creating more prosperous, stable societies, which is in the UK’s interest.

The UK is continuing its leading role by hosting an international summit on family planning in London next week and I very much welcome the Secretary of State’s personal commitment to prioritising this agenda. Working with the UN Population Fund and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the summit aims to boost global commitment to ensuring women and girls have access to family planning services. Can any of us here in the UK imagine not having this access and the choices it provides? The summit will procure a range of new commitments from developing countries, donors and other partners. These commitments will increase access to family planning services for women and girls in the world’s poorest countries, fix problems with supply chains and prioritise the needs of women and girls in humanitarian crises.

Jumping to the fact that the aid budget is taxpayers’ money, I will just illustrate this with two small stories. I had a conversation recently with someone who had been a consultant in one of the big consultancies where I was making the case that so many girls were now educated in a way they were not before. The consultant said to me: “How do you know? I have worked in remote areas in Pakistan and a girl will turn up once and the box will be ticked and she may never turn up again”. I encourage my noble friend to be aware of what is actually going on. In another story, a friend was looking at a project in Pakistan where they were feeding children and giving them lunch. A sign said that meat was included in the rice. My friend, understanding Urdu, heard the project leader say to a worker, “Where is the meat in this rice? I told you today we have important visitors coming and we need the meat in the rice”. That could be happening far more on the ground than we are probably aware of.

The noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, talked about small charities. I strongly endorse his point. Mary’s Meals, of which a number of noble Lords will be aware, gets not a penny from the taxpayer but provides fantastic value for money and feeds millions of children across Africa. The aid budget is taxpayers’ money and the Government have a duty to communicate to the UK public how this hard-earned money is spent effectively, delivers results for the world’s poorest people and is not subject to waste or corruption. They should continue to drive for greater efficiency and value for money and I commend the Minister for the work he is doing in this space.