Millennium Development Goals

Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead Excerpts

Thursday 7th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, for initiating this debate and, indeed, for giving us his usual wise and comprehensive account of the issues we are discussing. At the outset I pay tribute to the remarkable achievements of the Labour Government on all aspects of international development, including the millennium development goals. We trebled the aid budget, cancelled debt, established DfID and for the first time had a Secretary of State for International Development sitting in the Cabinet. Yet in spite of the efforts made by world leaders, many of the MDGs remain dangerously off track. We know that, according to the Institute of Development Studies, unless MDG progress accelerates more than 1 billion people will be living in dollar-a-day poverty in 2015. At current rates, we will not halve poverty in sub-Saharan Africa, which is the objective of MDG 1, before 2141.

Attention must be paid to achieving better accountability and to providing the predictable long-term funding which Governments in developing countries need if they are to plan a health infrastructure and get children into school. Critically, funds must be additional. This has to be new money. We do not want to see a rebadging and recycling of money that has already been pledged. I am afraid that we are seeing far too much of that in many countries. I very much hope that I can be given an assurance today that the funds that will be needed for resourcing adaptation to and mitigation of climate change will be new money and will not be transferred across from what is meant to be overseas development assistance. We also need to look at innovative sources of funding development. I am very much in favour of taxation on financial transactions—the so-called Robin Hood tax. France and Spain have already called for such a tax and I hope that the Government will support their position.

Critically, we need to invest in more and better opportunities for women and girls, as the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, intimated. We need to invest very seriously and conscientiously in the economic, legal and political empowerment of women and girls. Gender equity has a multiplier effect on all the MDGs and arguably offers the most significant linkages between the millennium development goals. For instance, if we ensure that girls have increased and unfettered access to education, we will have more of a linkage to better health and nutrition. Enhancing access to reproductive and maternal health contributes to all the MDGs. Maternal mortality in sub-Saharan Africa has barely changed in two decades. Women also need to benefit from equitable land distribution, which increases output and provides better food security. Safe water and sources of energy reduce the burden of women’s domestic activity. Discrimination is pervasive and ensures that women are more likely than men to be in low-paid jobs with no social protection. Violence against women was rightly described recently as a global pandemic.

On MDGs 4 and 5, which were a major focus in New York, I should be very interested in a response from the Minister to criticism that statements and announcements from DfID are focusing too much on newborn and one-month old babies rather than on children under five.

In conclusion, the millennium declaration represents a commitment to social justice and promises to promote equity and tackle social inclusion. I hope that will be the outcome of the MDGs.