Poverty Eradication and sustainable development

Debate between Grant Shapps and Patrick Grady

Wednesday 4th November 2015 General Committees

[Grant Shapps]

The big difference with the original millennium goals was that they referred to developing countries. The global goals apply to us all, as the hon. Lady’s question implies.

We are absolutely determined to learn lessons from the original millennium goals. A huge amount of work has gone into this. When I was in New York for the UNGA and the launch of the new global goals, I attended many sessions that dealt with the extent to which the millennium goals have been implemented. I spent a lot of time looking at the relative success of DFID in the countries that we work with, particularly in Africa, and at their achievements against those goals. A large body of work was involved in that and I am very happy to write to the hon. Lady with further details on the extent to which we judged the millennium goals had been met.

The hon. Lady is right to say that the new global goals affect us all. We have signed up just as much as any of the African countries I was talking about. All the goals apply to us. It is early days, as I mentioned in my speech. The UK will be developing a framework for the way in which the goals will be judged. The Office for National Statistics will play a key role in that process and is currently working on it.

The hon. Lady specifically mentioned the issue of inequality. The Government are passionate about dealing with inequality. We believe that the best way to deal with it is to make sure that, for example, in this country, unemployment levels are kept low. We have half the unemployment level of our nearest similar economy, France—exactly half its unemployment level. Inequality is best tackled by making sure that people have work.

Inequality is certainly one of the areas that will be judged by the new global goals. Members will have more detail shortly on how that will be put into statistics.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

I associate myself with the remarks welcoming the opportunity for debate. Can the Minister say what discussions or communications he has had with the devolved Administrations about the implementation of the goals—the Scottish Government and the Welsh Assembly have an outreach and international development presence; I believe Northern Ireland is considering a similar role—and about the domestic application of the goals?

[Grant Shapps]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. As he knows, I am always very keen to engage with the devolved Administrations. He and I have had many conversations, particularly about the excellent partnership between Malawi and Scotland, which has been so important to the UK’s development role in that country. I will certainly be taking those discussions forward with him and Members of the other devolved Administrations.

As I have mentioned, the goals were only put in place in September. Ensuring that we have a proper 15-year plan for their implementation, including the involvement of our devolved Administrations, is top of our agenda. Before anyone says, “Why isn’t this happening more quickly?” in the case of the millennium goals, I think the world was rather too slow in coming together. It took several years before people woke up to the fact that we were in danger of missing many of the goals and then things really got going. We are determined that that will not be the case here. The hon. Gentleman and others can expect to see a huge amount of activity by us as we frame how best to deliver the goals both domestically and internationally.