Humanitarian Emergency Response Review

Debate between Emma Reynolds and Andrew Mitchell

Wednesday 15th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

The hon. Lady makes a very good point. She identifies two of Britain’s brilliant NGOs, RedR and WaterAid, which both do such good work in some of the most challenging places anywhere in the world. She also identifies the importance of clean water and sanitation. Britain is doing this in terms of steady state development, with a commitment to get more clean water and sanitation to people in the poor world than the total population of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and in terms of our work through the cluster system, giving strong support on water and sanitation, not least to Oxfam. That is an absolute priority in almost all humanitarian disasters.

[Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

The objectives set out in Lord Ashdown’s report will require what he calls “transformational change” across the Department to give greater prominence to the humanitarian agenda. In the Government’s response, will the Secretary of State set out in more detail how he intends to bring forward that transformational change, in particular with regard to staffing and programming of DFID projects?

[Mr Mitchell]

The answer is that I will and I have. I commend to the hon. Lady the 35-page report, which should now be on the internet, and I urge her to have a look at it and respond if she has any additional comments—as I urge all hon. Members to do.

Aid Reviews

Debate between Emma Reynolds and Andrew Mitchell

Tuesday 1st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

I am afraid that I cannot give that precise figure to my hon. Friend off the top of my head, but I shall write to her on the matter. What I can tell her is that last year Britain educated about 5 million children overseas, but that figure will rise substantially in the future.

[Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

Further to the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), does the Secretary of State recognise that the new agency UN Women needs some certainty about its budget in order to prepare its strategic plan, rather than the other way around? Will he therefore lead from the front, instead of delaying his decision as to how much to commit to this vital UN agency?

[Mr Mitchell]

I can reassure the hon. Lady that we are in very close touch with UN Women. When the plan is produced, I am sure we will be able to fund it. Meanwhile, we have given some hundreds of thousands of pounds in transitional funding to assist the agency to get to that point. This agency has only just been started; the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) suggested we failed to fund it last year, but it has only just come into existence. With the transitional funding, it will be able to produce its strategic plan, and then I am sure we will be able to fund it.