International Development (Official Development Assistance Target) Bill

James Gray Excerpts

Friday 12th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Moore]

The hon. Lady makes a different point but it goes to the theme of the previous intervention. This is about legacy. If we get this right now, invest in the right way and support people, they in turn will be able to support themselves, and their children and grandchildren will live very different lives.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

No one in this House doubts the value of aid, and the various points we have heard concerning women and poverty. Of course that is right, and the more we can spend on aid overseas—we are a rich country—the better, but that is not what the Bill is about. The Bill is about writing that figure into law. Why should spending on overseas aid be written into law, but not the national health service or domestic spending of any kind? Why should overseas aid be the only thing written into law?

[Michael Moore]

I hope that hon. Members will acknowledge that I have given way fairly generously over the past 10 minutes, which has meant that I have not yet advanced most of my arguments. Even if I slightly despair of persuading the hon. Gentleman in the course of my arguments, I hope he will allow me to make them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Brown]

First of all, I have to say to the hon. Gentleman that his party made a promise, and it is a duty of a party that makes a promise to try to keep it, to do what the party said and to legislate in law. The problem we face with the general public is that we make promises, but the public still do not trust us to keep them. That is why it is important that this debate leads to action and results. As for the cost-effectiveness of aid, let me provide the hon. Gentleman with another example, and then others might like to enter the debate.

I have recently been to Juba, the capital of South Sudan, the newest country in the world, which is trying to move forward. I went to a village school just outside Juba and I asked the women there—young mothers, many of whom had been child brides at the age of 12 or 13—what they wanted most. Of course, as I said about those in Syria and Lebanon, they needed food, protection, shelter and security, as they were in the midst of the threats and violence that come whenever there is a civil war, but they also said that what they wanted was education for their children.

I went to a small village hut school just outside Juba that was serving that village. There were 20 young children in that very small, one-hut school. What I remember seeing was 100 children outside the school looking in through a portal—one small window in this hut of a school—at something that they could not have because there were only 20 places for a village of hundreds of people.

The plan was drawn up for $200 million to be spent on educating the children of South Sudan. Only a third of children are at school and there are only about 60 girls in the final year of secondary education. The plan cost $4 a week—$200 a year—for these children to get education. The problem was not the willingness of the Government to do it or that there were no plans to do it; the problem was that nobody in the international community was able to come up with the extra $100 million—for a cost-effective project that, at $4 a week, nobody could doubt would be worth the money—despite efforts by this Government and others. Nobody in the international community was able to bring together the $200 million that might have brought children to school.

If anybody is in any doubt about other services, let me say this about education. Education unlocks the future. Education unlocks opportunity. The reason why we can cut child mortality and maternal mortality is that the death rate for educated people and educated mothers is half that of others. If anybody is in any doubt about what education has been able to do, there are 400,000 children who have been brought into school as a result of the aid budget of this Government and the previous Governments, in a way that did not happen before 2000.

[Mr Gray]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Brown]

I will, but I think I am responding to the points.

[Mr Gray]

We are, as the right hon. Gentleman correctly says, spending 0.7% now and not achieving the various things that he has listed. We all support international aid—of course we do; there is no question about that at all. The question is simply whether there is any advantage in writing the figure of 0.7% into the law of the land. If so, why should we do that for children around the world when we do not do it for British children with cancer, for example?

[Mr Brown]

We can talk about other areas of policy, but let me remind the House that every party made a promise. Every party debated and discussed this, and every party decided that they would legislate so that aid was a requirement at 0.7% and that the Government would honour that, so the hon. Gentleman is saying to his own party that it made a mistake in doing so. If that is his view, let him have the debate with his own party.

Let me respond to the point about cost-effective aid. I do not think the hon. Gentleman knows this figure, but the average amount of aid for education—I will come to health in a minute—for a sub-Saharan African child, in all the poorest countries of Africa, from the international aid agencies, Britain and America, put together is $13 a year per child. We spend £5,000 a year on the education of a child in Britain. The average amount of aid for a child in Africa, at $13, is barely enough to pay for a second-hand textbook, and he is somehow suggesting that this is not cost-effective and is too much.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Swayne]

I agree with my hon. and learned Friend. I do not believe that any of our expenditure in that line creates dependency; it is designed to reduce dependency.

There are all sorts of arguments to be had about whether the figure should be 0.7%, and a long debate might be had on that basis. Indeed, we might be having one today. All I can say is that, as an elected politician, I feel that I am bound by the commitments I have made. I made a commitment to 0.7% at the last general election, and I intend to stick with it. That is the Government’s policy.

[Mr Gray]

The debate so far has been rather unfortunate. People seem to be saying that if someone supports the Bill, they are compassionate and care about the world, but if they oppose it, they are a heartless rotter. I do not believe that that is the case. I strongly support the figure of 0.7%, and I agree with everything that has been said about supporting poor people around the world. That is not the question. The question is why this needs to be written into the United Kingdom’s statute book. It is not about whether or not we support aid. Why should there be a law?

[Mr Swayne]

Because this has been an international aspiration for so long, and because it is an issue on which we wish to take the lead. We are leading in this matter, and that gives our country enormous authority when we speak on these matters. And I am glad to say that the young people of this country are passionate about this, as I see in school after school in my constituency. I hope that their parents will be as proud as they are of our achievements. I hope that those young people will go home and tell them how many children we have vaccinated this year, and how much we have done for those who are less fortunate than they are. In that respect, I urge my hon. Friends and all hon. Members to support the Bill.