Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Laurence Robertson and Vicky Ford(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)
Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Laurence Robertson and Vicky Ford(2 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)
While the world rightly focuses on the terrible events in Ukraine, I remind the House of the terrible ongoing conflict in the Tigray region of Ethiopia, where women in particular are suffering the most terrible attacks and there is also a potential famine. I know that the Minister is taking a deep interest in that, but can the Government do any more to help?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (Vicky Ford)
I thank my hon. Friend for continuing to shine a light on the terrible situation in Ethiopia. It is the world’s most severe humanitarian crisis. From north to south, 30 million people require life-saving aid, 5 million people have been displaced because of conflict and tens of millions of people are affected by the drought. Again, I urge all parties in the north of the country to lay down their arms and facilitate humanitarian access. Since December, one truck has got through, but 100 a day are needed. There is a high-scale risk of loss of life. We must continue to stand with the people of Ethiopia and, as my hon. Friend says, especially the women and girls on International Women’s Day.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Laurence Robertson and Vicky Ford(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)
As chairman of the all-party parliamentary group for Ethiopia, may I thank the Minister for all the work that she is doing on this terribly difficult issue? We recently saw the Prime Minister of Ethiopia taking up arms himself and urging others to do so, which demonstrates the seriousness of the situation. I do not think that it is an exaggeration to fear that the very existence of Ethiopia may be at stake and at risk. Does the Minister feel that the United Nations could be doing more to bring about peace in the country?
Vicky Ford
My hon. Friend is absolutely right: it is a truly tragic situation. Civilians have experienced appalling, outrageous abuses, including widespread sexual violence. We are fully supporting the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in her calls for further timely discussion of the report of the joint human rights investigation and its recommendations at the UN in Geneva.
Department for International Development
Debate between Laurence Robertson and Vicky Ford(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Robertson
Absolutely. I am sure that Madam Deputy Speaker would not want me to go too far down that road, but it is a good point.
Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that it is also in our national interests to keep up our investment in international aid? By making poorer countries more stable, we improve the world’s stability. By tackling diseases, we stop them spreading to our own country. If we are to fight climate change, we need to fight it globally. Aid is not just the right thing to do morally, but it is in our interests to continue it.
Mr Robertson
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We could take things even further because, in the commercial sense, if countries across the world are richer, that affords us new markets as well, which is in addition to the humanitarian reasons for aid that she rightly outlines.
DFID’s budget is around the £14 billion mark. While it is certainly a small part of our overall income, as was raised earlier, it is still a considerable amount of money. The aid budget has its critics and criticisms, of course, and I will come on to one or two of them, because some may be valid. Perhaps we can improve matters, and we should certainly never be satisfied with where we are, because we can always do better. We all have constituents who point out that some of our schools and our police are short of money, so if we are going to spend money abroad, helping people who are not from this country, then we must ensure that we spend it wisely and effectively, and this estimates day debate is about addressing the budget in the wider sense.
It is worth touching on exactly how aid works. This may come as a surprise to some, but DFID itself spends around 75% of the aid budget, with the other 25% being spent by other Departments, such as the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Department for Health and Social Care and the Home Office, and other outside organisations. Some of the aid that we provide is bilateral and some is multilateral, and I will come on to the difference in a minute.
The National Audit Office report, which came out just a few days ago, says that most of our aid is going to the right places and having a great effect, but it did point out that there is room for improvement. As I go through one or two areas in which we can improve, the observations that I will make are not in any way a criticism of our approach of our aid policy because, as the House has heard, I am supportive of it.