Conflict, Stability and Security Fund

Baroness Goldie Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, for securing a debate on this important issue. As others have rightly observed, he has a record of having a profound interest in and knowledge of these matters. I have to say to your Lordships that the noble Lord and I last faced one another across a parliamentary Chamber when he was First Minister of Scotland, and we had a weekly clash at First Minister’s Questions. I am glad that our debating debut in this Chamber is on a perhaps more consensual issue. I also thank all other noble Lords for their contributions to this important debate.

The Conflict, Stability and Security Fund, or CSSF, was launched in April 2015 and is rising this year to £1.127 billion. It is a major investment by this Government, not only in countries at risk of conflict and instability but also in this country’s national security interests. It is making a real impact in the short term and building impact for the long term. This impact is being felt not just in the countries in which the fund operates. It is also improving how we work across government.

CSSF projects are subject to rigorous oversight. All potential projects are assessed against the objectives of National Security Council strategies for individual countries or regions. These strategies cover the breadth of UK government interests and resources. They provide a framework that enables National Security Council departments to prioritise activity, and they set the objectives that guide our work. Projects that do not contribute to these objectives are not approved.

Once started, projects are assessed on a quarterly basis by ambassador-led implementation boards at our posts overseas. They consider whether projects are delivering against the objectives and giving value for money, as well as the risks and how they are managed. Their findings are passed to regional boards in London, chaired by FCO directors and with representatives from across Whitehall. These boards assess whether the project and its wider programme are still the most effective way to meet the National Security Council objectives and, if not, they can reallocate the funds to other works. All projects and programmes are also reviewed annually against their target outputs and outcomes. The stabilisation unit is a key source of expertise for these reviews. Other larger programmes use independent organisations to ensure thorough monitoring and evaluation.

As I said earlier, the fund has been running for only 18 months but its projects are already making an impact. Let me give your Lordships three examples. In Syria, we are leading international support for the White Helmets, the Syrian-led search and rescue organisation that has saved over 56,000 civilian lives. Our assistance—£32 million to date—provides equipment and training, as well as funds to run their vehicles and support their families. Three-quarters of Lebanon’s border with Syria is now secure thanks to support from the fund, and previously there was little control. That secure border is preventing Daesh expanding the Syrian conflict into Lebanon—and stopping Daesh expand is obviously good for Lebanon’s security and for our security.

The UK has also bilaterally supported the Colombian peace process, with a range of projects to increase the Colombian Administration’s capacity and strategic planning. From this year, in addition to our bilateral work assisting the justice sector to pursue reforms, we also used multilateral implementers such as the United Nations to address challenges of implementation. Through the CSSF, the UK was the first donor to contribute to the United Nations Trust Fund. Importantly, that unlocked funding from other donors. I understand that today, as part of the Colombia state visit, the Prime Minister has announced an additional £7.5 million for the Colombia CSSF programme, which will be used for a range of programmes supporting peacebuilding. In Ukraine, we have delivered defensive military training to around 2,000 Ukrainians to build the capability and resilience of the Ukrainian armed forces. In East Africa, funding expanded the presence of our criminal justice advisers, which enabled the Crown Prosecution Service to play a key role in the largest cocaine seizure in UK history, worth £512 million.

The CSSF has radically changed our approach to delivering international assistance. The rationale behind the fund was to draw on all the national security assets at the UK Government’s disposal and to use them in combination. This has led to three outcomes: a clearer sense of UK objectives in fragile and conflict-affected countries, as opposed to single departmental objectives; greater co-ordination between Whitehall departments overseas, improving the effectiveness of our work; and a deeper understanding of programme delivery in National Security Council departments, beyond the Department for International Development. For example, in Pakistan, the fund has brought together the Department for International Development, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Ministry of Defence, the Home Office, the National Crime Agency and the Crown Prosecution Service. By pooling their different skills and experience, they have developed a single strategic and integrated UK approach to support rule of law reforms.

We have helped the Punjab Government to develop Pakistan’s first provincial rule of law roadmap. We are enhancing the capacity and accountability of the Pakistani police, prosecutors, forensics professionals and the judiciary, as well as improving access to justice, especially for the most vulnerable. This work supports Pakistan’s capacity to tackle terrorism through the judicial process. It also encourages an approach to organised crime that draws on expertise from all Pakistan’s relevant agencies.

I will now try to deal with some of the contributions that arose during the debate. My friend the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, raised the issue of the overall strategy. As I have tried to indicate, there is a strategy: indeed, this fund supports three of the four strands of the UK aid strategy, and he will be familiar with those. I hope that reassures him that there is an overall umbrella plan. He also raised the issue of funding. The CSSF does issue multiyear contracts beyond two years and supports civil society in countries at risk of instability. He raised an important point about transparency that was picked up by other contributors, not least the noble Baroness, Lady Northover. We are looking at how we can publish a redacted version of the strategies and the allocations, recognising that much of the work operates in highly sensitive environments. I hope that gives him some reassurance that we are alert to the understandable desire to know a little more about what is going where, and what is happening.

My noble friend Lady Hodgson made an important point about the number of areas of conflict—something worth reminding ourselves about. That helped to underpin the relevance and effectiveness of the CSS fund. She also mentioned conflict prevention. I hope my noble friend has found my contributions to date helpful in explaining the cross-departmental and joined-up operation of the fund. Clearly, if we harness all these agencies, we can make a very significant contribution to trying to prevent conflict.

My noble friend Lady Hodgson also raised the important matter of women. Gender is the only mandatory theme in CSSF programmes. Indeed, embassies have more control over that funding than they did in the conflict pool. It is a devolved structure whereby the ambassador chairs all departmental meetings in representative countries to oversee the strategy and delivery of the whole programme in that country.

The noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, raised an important point about language. I agree: there is a need to be precise in describing what we seek to address and how we propose to deal with it. On his observation about the fund, the fund is working: it has impact and is making a difference. I hope the cross-departmental approach to the fund, which I explained in some detail in response to other contributors, addresses some of the concerns he raised.

The noble Lord, Lord Judd, made an important point that the fund should enable and not replace development. I hope that some of the examples I have given of what the fund has made possible to some extent reassure him. He raised an important series of specific issues and wisely anticipated that I would be completely unable to answer them. He is absolutely right, but I undertake to write to him and place a copy of the letter in the Library. However, turning to one of the points that he raised, training is provided by the fund to peacekeeping troops, which includes training on the protection of civilians, including children. The CSSF is continuing to support community policing in refugee camps in Jordan.

The noble Baroness, Lady Northover, also raised the issue of the fund’s transparency, and I hope my earlier reply to the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, somewhat reassured her. On the issue of women, she will note my response to my noble friend Lady Hodgson. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, also commented on the issue of strategy, and I hope I have managed to outline for him the strategic umbrella under which all this is operating. The issue of transparency, also raised by the noble Lord, is important. He will have heard what I said in response to the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, but I would observe that this is a young fund which has not been on the go for all that long. I hope that the further information I have provided will reassure him.

This has been a helpful debate that has assisted in teasing out some issues about which, understandably, there is a desire for more information. I am not unsympathetic to that point, which I shall take back and look at carefully. Although it is a young fund, the Conflict, Stability and Security Fund is tasked with tackling all conflicts. It is operating in often unstable and dangerous areas. It will not solve these conflicts and bring about stability overnight, but we are delivering projects that have an impact and make a difference: they are contributing to longer term stability and security. That is welcome and is a very positive dividend from our investment.