Afghanistan

Andrew Jones Excerpts

Thursday 13th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. One of the things that struck me in my first few days in this role is just how common some of the challenges we all face are. Education is the route for all of us to make the most of ourselves. That is why it is so important that children in Afghanistan should also have the chance to develop into the people they can be. Some 5.9 million children—nearly 6 million—are now attending school in Afghanistan, which is a huge, dramatic increase. Nearly 40% or so are now girls. Let us remember that under the Taliban none of them were girls and there were also far fewer children in school. If we are to see long-term progress, we have to enable people in Afghanistan, particularly children, to get the knowledge and skills to develop their country themselves. That is one of the most important things we are doing.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for her statement. Please can she explain what role the UK is playing in improving governance in Afghanistan?

[Justine Greening]

Obviously we are playing a leading role in this area. The most important thing we are doing is supporting Afghan departments to be effective. We have funded advisers helping them not just to work on policy, but to do very straightforward tasks such as planning budgets, executing budgets and monitoring financial spend. All those things are relatively straightforward, but they are the key ingredients that need to be in place for public services to be delivered well. When public services are delivered well in Afghanistan, that will lead to increasing buy-in among the Afghan people, as they see their country moving in the right direction. If we can do that, it will create, I hope, a more virtuous circle, so that we see more and more development continuing in future.