USAID Funding Pause

David Mundell Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Hobhouse. I declare my interest as co-chair of both the APPG on nutrition for development and the APPG on HIV, AIDS and sexual health.

This is a period of great uncertainty, not just because of what has happened in the US, but because of what is happening in the UK. Perhaps this debate is a couple of days early, because when the new Minister for International Development, Baroness Chapman of Darlington, appeared before the International Development Committee, everything was predicated on the spending review. Indeed, the Committee had to send back the Government’s response to our inquiry on hunger and sustainable development goal 2 because there was no substance in the reply, since everything was predicated on the outcome of the spending review.

I hope that tomorrow we will get certainty. I do not expect the Minister to be able to advance anything specific today, but it is important that we have that certainty, because uncertainty is one of the worst features affecting our ability to plan and to combat the issues that we face globally. Obviously, the US has contributed enormously to that uncertainty. It is still not clear what is happening in the US, and that is why I welcome the fact that the International Development Committee will soon visit Washington and New York. It will be a fact-finding visit, so that we can ascertain exactly what the approach is, and whether Mr Musk’s departure means anything for how these matters will be dealt with.

I do not want to dwell too much on regret about the American situation. I think that we have to move on, as others have said, to a new debate about the future model of development. The Government, through the Minister for International Development, have indicated that that is their view, but again, there have not been many clues as to exactly what that might mean. We have heard about a realignment of existing multilateral organisations; it is not clear to me what that means. What I am clear on is that the UK should continue to contribute significantly to Gavi, the Global Fund and Unitaid, because those are multilateral organisations that deliver on their own specific objectives but also provide a backbone for health services in many poorer countries. Without those interventions, there would not be a health service being offered at all, so it is vital that we continue.

Cutting mid-way through programmes is always chaotic. One of the most shocking things that I heard in recent evidence to the International Development Committee was about a US cut during the overwhelming of Goma in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. We heard that the radio system, which was operated by volunteers, had to be switched off during that attack. That meant that people could not hear where the attack was coming from and where to go to be safe. I think that everybody who heard that evidence, from the guy who had to do that, understood how hard it was—and it was the direct consequence of a cut.

I want to focus on nutrition and give some key facts. A billion women and girls suffer from malnutrition, which impacts their health, productivity and economic futures. Malnutrition is a leading killer, responsible for one in five maternal deaths and nearly half of child deaths under the age of five. Malnutrition costs the global economy more than $1.6 trillion annually in lost productivity and potential. US aid cuts could lead to 1 million children with severe and acute malnutrition losing access to treatment annually. But it can be—and it has been—different. We know that for every $1 invested, $23 is returned to the local economy. Investing in nutrition is not charity, and it is not even the moral thing to do; it is a strategic decision and investment, and the UK, US and other funders should continue to do it.

The UK Government are being asked to invest £50 million in the child nutrition fund. The UK has historically been a leader in the funding of child nutrition interventions. In both 2022 and 2023, the UK committed £6 million to the fund, which has high-impact, cost-effective malnutrition solutions. With the funding crisis caused by US cuts, the ask is now £50 million.

I hope that on the IDC’s visit to the US, we will find out more about what is happening with HIV/AIDS, because there are competing suggestions about whether the US will return to funding. The hon. Member for Norwich North (Alice Macdonald) alluded to women and girls; one of the most important messages we have to get across is that in sub-Saharan Africa, it is women and girls who are most affected by HIV, and it is important to continue funding there.

I also agree with the hon. Member about the importance of science and innovation as we move forward in this new development world. I had the opportunity to visit the John Innes Centre outside Norwich, as well as Rothamsted Research in Harpenden, where a huge amount of research is going ahead. The research and scientific leadership that the UK can offer might be the replacement for the financial leadership we offered in the past.

--- Later in debate ---

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

It is indeed an honour to serve under your chairship, Mrs Hobhouse, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Melksham and Devizes (Brian Mathew) for securing this important debate.

Since the new US Administration took office in January, President Trump and Elon Musk have gutted USAID—the world’s foremost dispenser of humanitarian funding and expertise, through which America saved the lives of many of the world’s poorest people. Trump’s budget proposals to Congress for the coming fiscal year reduce foreign assistance spend by almost 85%, all while the need for it increases. In a deadly year, when 120 armed conflicts raging across the globe, the number of people suffering from acute food insecurity has nearly tripled in six years, from 135 million in 2019 to 340 million today. The nation that previously built development’s architecture has largely disappeared almost overnight. There is an urgent need for someone to step up and assume the convening and facilitating role that America once played. Many looked to Britain, and in that month, when we all held our breath, we were blindsided instead by this Labour Government cutting development spending to its lowest level this century.

It is difficult to fully comprehend the scale of the cuts to USAID or their impact. In 2024, America spent roughly $70 billion on international development. Its contribution represented 40% of all humanitarian aid recorded that year. But it is not just the money. Every other country, international NGO and development body relies on the humanitarian architecture that America built and supported. It was America that funded much of the most valuable data collection, which determined where other countries directed their resources. NGOs I have spoken to explained how American-funded analysis often provided the early warning system for looming hunger crises. Frequently it was money from the Americans that paid the administrative costs and overheads of NGOs working on the ground. That has been dismantled.

The world is already paying a heavy price for Trump’s and Musk’s decision to break American development leadership. Since the cuts, Boston University has been running a mathematical model of their likely toll. The model estimates that more than 300,000 people have died already, two thirds of them children. Every hour, the model believes, around another 100 people die. One can watch the number tick up almost in real time. A leaked memo originating with USAID estimated that the cuts would result in 200,000 children each year being paralysed by polio, that 1 million cases of severe acute malnutrition, which often results in death, would go untreated and that malaria would claim an additional 166,000 lives. There is a humanitarian catastrophe unfolding before our eyes. Millions of the world’s poorest people, including the poorest children, have lost lifesaving medical care because of those cuts.

Perhaps the heaviest blow of all has fallen upon the global effort to fight HIV and AIDS. The President’s emergency plan for AIDS relief, credited with saving 26 million lives in the last two decades, received a 90-day stop work order in January. The Trump Administration have now asked Congress to claw back money, some already allocated to PEPFAR. As a result, the global HIV response has been severely disrupted. Modelling by the Burnet Institute estimates that it will result in a 25% drop in funding for the global HIV response, and as many as 2.9 million excess HIV-related deaths by 2030.

[David Mundell]

I welcome the hon. Lady’s comments. It is very important we emphasise that it is women and girls who will be most affected by those cuts. It is not those stereotypes sometimes presented by some in the US who are affected; it is women and girls.

[Monica Harding]

The right hon. Member makes an excellent point, which I will come to later.

USAID modelling suggests that the actions of Trump and Musk could result in 28,000 new cases of infectious diseases, such as Ebola, each year. When Ebola ripped through west Africa a decade ago, it had a case fatality of around 40%. It was kept from our shores thanks to a global response in which America and Britain played crucial roles. When we step back from funding and supporting global health initiatives, we put ourselves at risk. I repeat the Liberal Democrats’ call for the Government to reaffirm our commitment to the replenishment of Gavi and the Global Fund, because it is the right thing to do for British interests.

There is some hope. The situation is still fluid, and I urge the Government to impress upon the US Administration the moral and strategic imperative for development. Meanwhile, the US Administration have emphasised that America will continue to provide humanitarian aid and respond to disasters, at least to a degree. That is welcome, but if the funding is to be effective it must be provided in accordance with foundational humanitarian principles: impartiality, neutrality and independence. Israel’s Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an American-backed scheme, disregards those principles. In consequence, it is dangerous, unworkable and profoundly insufficient. I hope the Minister takes this opportunity to affirm Britain’s commitment to those principles and to all allies, and to urge American counterparts to do the same.

The decisions taken by the US Administration to slash and gut USAID are profoundly depressing; that our Government have followed their lead is even more so. Britain is withdrawing when our voice is needed more than ever. The slashed UK aid budget cannot fulfil our commitments. We hear that Sudan, Gaza and Ukraine are ringfenced. In the absence of the US, we wonder about those other humanitarian hotspots: Afghanistan, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, DRC, Nigeria, Myanmar, South Sudan, Mali, Haiti and Bangladesh.

We hear that our Government’s priorities are conflict, climate change and health. What about women and girls, nutrition and education? At the same time, the Government toy with rhetoric and framing borrowed from the Trump playbook, saying that Britain is no longer a charity. Let us be clear and united: development serves British interests. It is not charity or a giant cash dispenser in the sky, but a deposit account for our safety and security. That is because funding global health is better than battling a pandemic; supporting peacebuilding is cheaper than fighting a war, or dealing with the terrorism that emerges out of instability; and aid in economic development and climate mitigation are better than coping with mass displacement and channel crossings.

Every crisis creates opportunities, and the American withdrawal is no different. While the USA dismantles overseas assistance—ripping out 85% of it, and the plumbing, too—Britain must use its tradition of leadership and step forward as a convening power, with bold and brave thinking and a long-term vision for aid, starting by laying out a road map for returning to 0.7% of GNI, as we are required to do by statute. That law has not changed. I worry about the Government’s failure to square that with the notoriously generous British public. The impact of the UK aid cut, alongside the US cut, has not been made clear. It will mean hundreds of thousands of lives lost worldwide.

Instead of short-term decision making and chasing domestic headlines, we must invest in a long-term vision for Britain and security for our future. We have yet to see any script from the Government on what Britain is for. How we behave now will define how we are seen on the world stage. We still have a seat at the table and we may say that we still have the expertise to lead, but if money does not follow, it would be arrogant to assume that we will keep that seat. Britain is compassionate. We do not have to follow America blindly; we can use our proud and long tradition in development and aid, look outwards and lead.