Sustainable Development Goals

Lord Collins of Highbury Excerpts

Wednesday 10th July 2019 Grand Committee

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, I too thank the Minister for introducing this afternoon’s debate. It has been fascinating and I am sure we will take this issue forward over the coming months and years. The two key differences, to which noble Lords have alluded, between the 2030 agenda and the millennium development goals is that the goals have become universal: all countries, including the wealthiest nations, are required to meet them; and, of course, we should leave no one behind.

Like my noble friend Lord McConnell and other noble Lords, I believe that the voluntary national review has been a missed opportunity; I will be a little critical as I go through my speech. The most important element of this agenda is how we raise awareness. How do we get the public engaged in this agenda? I am afraid I do not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Bird, that everyone is familiar with the SDGs. As my noble friend Lady Massey said, they are not a household topic—far from it. This process has been a missed opportunity, but it also reflects that the SDGs have not been prioritised by the United Kingdom Government. As my noble friend Lord McConnell also said, the UK had an early leadership role in the SDGs. It is disappointing that no action plan is yet in place for delivering them, and that there is now little sign of political commitment or high-level leadership.

Nor is it clear that the UK Government intend to implement “leave no one behind” in practice. In general, the overarching principle must be made clearer and involve leadership from the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State. We are told that instead of the action plan, all government departments have embedded the SDGs in their single departmental plans and that they have been asked to nominate an SDG champion at director level whose responsibility is to promote SDGs in their department. My noble friend Lady Lister highlighted very well what that means in reality: basically, not much. They do not represent the proactive approach to delivering the agenda in practice or help review whether government actions are genuinely delivering a more sustainable society or a more sustainable world. Many of the departments responsible for achieving the SDGs domestically have pushed the responsibility to DfID. Somehow it is DfID’s responsibility, but the department that does not have the necessary influence or network domestically. It also means that those resources specifically set aside to address poverty and inequality around the world have been diverted to what is supposed to be a UK domestic process. That is wrong. The Commons International Development Committee had an inquiry on this, which other noble Lords mentioned. Its conclusion was that cross-government engagement with the SDGs, up to the point of the initial consultation, had been woefully insufficient:

“Outside of DFID there is still very limited knowledge of the Goals among Whitehall officials”.


I suspect not much has changed since that report was published.

As we have heard in this debate, the goals are interconnected. They exist as a comprehensive framework. Unless they are considered together, progress on one goal is more likely to undermine progress against another or risk leaving particular countries, communities and groups behind. The delivery of the SDGs is also intrinsically connected to the delivery of other international commitments, which often address issues touched by the SDGs, for example, UK commitments to climate and environment agreements, international human rights and international labour standards. That is why it is so important that this debate is not seen as simply a failure of a matter for government action. It is most definitely about the business community, trade unions and worker representatives all adopting the agenda and seeing how that can impact on their objectives domestically and internationally. That is why the voluntary national review process is so important to raise awareness.

The issue is not just about cross-departmental work that requires an interconnected response, as the noble Baroness, Lady Manzoor said. I am also co-chair of the APPG on Nutrition for Growth. I echo the point she made about integrating nutrition across DfID’s portfolio. Nutrition interventions that have the most long-term, sustained impact are not nutrition-specific interventions, such as the delivery of food packages, but interventions that ensure that nutritious food can grow and reach the people who need it most and that ensure that those people have the means and the knowledge to buy and prepare it. That interconnected approach is so vital. What steps will the Minister take to ensure DfID is more effective in integrating nutrition across its portfolio?

A key requirement of the United Nations’ 2030 agenda is the national progress reports. All member states are expected to review their progress at least once in the period up to 2030. As I have said, it should have been the opportunity to engage diverse communities and stakeholders across the country to develop a positive vision for the United Kingdom in response to the serious social, environmental and economic challenges we face. I have referred to the process of the initial stage of drafting this VNR. Bond—the collective organisation—summed it up fairly accurately when it said that the overall main message lacked detail, particularly compared to other countries, and that it should serve to increase attention on the full VNR. I think that the Government heard that message. Certainly they appeared to try to go out to raise awareness but it was too little, too late. We should have done more, certainly in meeting the timelines.

I want to focus on a number of questions to the Minister, particularly about the engagements that have taken place. How have parliamentary, civil society, community and other types of input been taken on board or helped to shift the Government’s approach? How do the Government intend to continue engagement and consultation to step up action on the SDGs?

I recently attended the annual review process of the CDC. I am glad it does it and involves all stakeholders. However, we still very much need to focus on how everything the CDC does is delivering against the 2030 agenda. If it is promoting investments, how do they continue to activate change? It is not just a one-off thing. How do we improve not just the number but the quality of jobs so that those investments deliver? That is the sort of approach we need to see.

I do not want to focus too much on the domestic agenda as other noble Lords have done that. However, we could say that the SDGs are not solely a responsibility of the Government. In fact, one of the things that the national review indicated was that 65% of the 169 targets set out by the SDGs need local stakeholders to be involved in their creation and delivery. The review singled out climate change and a sustainable approach to adult social care as particularly urgent issues for local focus. How will we do that? There have been some positive initiatives at local government level, particularly in Birmingham. However, it is incredibly short-sighted to demand more of local government in delivering on the SDGs while cutting the resources it needs to do so. If we do that, this country will not meet its goals.

Is the Minister aware of whether there will be plans to develop a comprehensive SDG delivery plan? Will we learn from and be able to respond to the lessons that this review has given us?

Noble Lords have alluded to the fact that we are presenting the results of our report on the voluntary national review to the UN high-level political forum in New York, which is basically starting this week. The focus of the forum is on empowering people and ensuring inclusiveness and equality. It will certainly look at goal 4 on equality, education, decent work, economic growth and reduced inequality. As the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, said, reducing inequality is vital to tackling poverty and achieving most of the SDGs. In fact, the World Bank projection shows that at the current rate of economic growth, extreme poverty will not be eradicated by 2030 unless inequality is addressed.

One way to address inequality is through the tax system. Implementing tax reforms that would contribute to fairer and more sustainable tax systems globally is really important. Will that include implementing the measures in the Finance Act 2016 introducing public country-by-country reporting requirements for multinational companies and ensuring that we fully implement the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act in terms of public registers of beneficial ownership in UK Overseas Territories? Ensuring that countries can raise the revenue necessary in their own country to make global change is so important in the delivery of the SDGs.

I am sorry that I have banged on for a bit, but I want to conclude on a positive note, because I think there is something we can learn from this voluntary national review process, which is about the importance of how we engage civil society. I do not mean just NGOs engaged in development, although they are incredibly important; I mean faith groups, trade unions and the CBI. We should be much more focused on ensuring that we get that positive response from them too.

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to this interesting and thought-provoking debate. It reflects the capacity of the SDGs to inspire us and their central importance to us all. The goals have given us a way of talking about a wide range of urgent—sometimes even existential— issues and a framework to address them. Obviously, accomplishing all the goals by 2030 will require a monumental effort. They are complex and evolving issues, and we must use every lever at our disposal.

The UK’s VNR covers our domestic and international work, both of which have been touched on today. It has a particular focus on the domestic, as suggested by the UN guidelines, but each country reporting where it stands on the goals is the best way to build an accurate global picture. It would be extremely arrogant for us to opine on the state of the world outside our borders without fully acknowledging that there are areas where we most definitely fall short as a country. We need to work harder both at home and abroad to ensure that no one is left behind. The country needs to become healthier, safer, better educated, cleaner and greener. We need to take further strides on gender equality. We need to see greater prosperity and sustainable development. But we should also celebrate the successes we have seen in the VNR. That is not merely an exercise in self-congratulation: we hope that recording proven success will serve as an inspiration for greater efforts and allow us to share best practice with other countries.

A wide range of issues was addressed in the debate, in both the international and domestic sphere. As I said, I shall aim to get through them. To the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, I apologise for forgetting to mention the global goals APPG in my opening remarks. It does excellent work and I look forward to working with it as we take the next steps on the road to 2030. As we tease out how we move forward, from a cross-government perspective and with stakeholders, I entirely agree with his positive view of the goals: that they are comprehensive and attempt to address the causes of underdevelopment and poverty. I also agree on the importance of countries’ accountability through the VNR process.

I also agree with some of the noble Lord’s criticism of how we have dealt with the goals since 2015. I can reassure him of the support that the goals have from me and the Secretary of State. He mentioned the current political situation. I shall not attempt to predict what is going to happen in the future or in the next couple of weeks, but I agree that the UK should play a leading role, as we did at the outset. I shall certainly do my best to facilitate that. The VNR has been a learning process—I shall probably say that quite a lot today—both in how we deal with the implementation of the goals within the country and how we work across government. There is a great opportunity ahead of the UN General Assembly with the SDG summit. We will have a new Prime Minister, which will gather everybody together. We need to see stops on the road to which we can all work to help raise further awareness.

I also strongly agree with the noble Lord on the importance of goal 16. As I said in opening, the UK fought for that from the outset. I am attending a UK-run side event on goal 16 at the UN next week which will underline our commitment to that goal and encourage further action on it from others.

Many questions were asked on how government will continue to oversee the delivery of the goals, including by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister. We are taking a co-ordinated approach across Whitehall to implementing the goals. There are a number of existing mechanisms to facilitate interdepartmental ministerial discussions on the importance of the goals, including in the Cabinet, at Permanent Secretary-level meetings and at other official-level meetings covering specific policy areas. However, the noble Lord’s criticism and that of others is fair. The national review commits us to a proper review of ministerial and official-level structures to support further domestic implementation. We will work on that once we have presented to the UN.

Engaging stakeholders, be they NGOs, faith groups or parliamentarians—

[Lord Collins of Highbury]

Trade unions.

[Baroness Sugg]

I am coming on to trade unions, because we have consulted them. The Government will not achieve the global goals alone. We need to make sure that every level of society, from the individual through to the biggest company and the trade unions, is involved. I would add local authorities to that, too. We need to do more to raise awareness. We held many events—I pointed to some of them in my opening remarks—to engage different parts of society and stakeholders. They have generated some good momentum which we need to make sure is not a flash in the pan. I acknowledge the criticism that stakeholder engagement was perhaps not perfect. We perhaps did not give as much notice as we could have given. That falls into the box of things to learn and improve on in future. However, we are trying to maintain the momentum that we have seen and take it forward. We are considering next steps in how best to design a mechanism for both stakeholder engagement groups and government. We will be working on that in coming weeks and months with the APPG, stakeholders and across parties to ensure that we get it right and improve things. The noble Lord asked how we might improve independent scrutiny. Perhaps regular independent scrutiny is important and needs to be built into the mechanism.

The noble Lord, Lord Purvis, talked about the importance of 0.7%. Our work in supporting the goals is underpinned by our continued commitment to 0.7%. I am proud to have worked for the coalition Government who put that provision on the statute book, and I pay tribute to him for sponsoring it. We are proud of that 0.7% and continue to be committed to it.

On the question of the national interest and diverting money away, we invest 0.7% of our GNI on ODA to help tackle global challenges such as disease, terrorism and conflict, and to create a safer, healthier and more prosperous world. It is in our national interest to do so and I do not agree that there is a tension between reducing poverty and spending aid in the national interest. The drivers of poverty, fragility and exclusion are broad and wide-ranging and often intersect with the UK’s prosperity and national security aims. It is therefore important that development is considered as part of the Government’s wider policy-making process. The Prime Minister set out in August of last year that development is at the heart of the UK’s international agenda.

The noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, asked about other departments. There was a recent NAO report on how government departments spend ODA money and we will study it carefully. I wish I could provide the noble Earl with reassurance on the independence of DfID—of which I am strongly in favour—but, again, I cannot predict the future. I gently assert that perhaps there may be other priorities for the new Prime Minister. We must continue to make the case for 0.7% and for the work we do on international development, and the VNR is a good opportunity to highlight that work internationally.

We make sure that every pound spent of the UK budget offers value for money, and must continue to do so for those who need it most, as well as for the UK taxpayer. As I said, I do not think there is a trade-off between poverty reduction and the national interest. However, I agree with many of the noble Lord’s comments on tied aid and conditionality. As he said, the UK has a strong reputation on this and I agree that we must not put that at risk. Being number two on the principled aid index is no bad place to be. Luxembourg is above us, but we can always do better and hit the number one spot. We can also help other countries to improve, and we are doing that.

The noble Lord also mentioned development finance initiatives, an area in which work is increasing. We are doing a great deal of work within the department to consider how best to develop that going forward. There is a huge financing gap but, sadly, I cannot guarantee the new Prime Minister’s attendance at the finance for development meeting ahead of UNGA. I reassure him, however, that we are fully aware of the importance of getting it right in order to meet the gap and fully finance the delivery of the goals.

I join the noble Lord, Lord Bird, in his desire to kick a hole in poverty. He spoke compellingly of how achieving goal 1 will bring about much of what we want to see across the other goals. I would not kick the rest of the 17 goals out—they help us destroy poverty, and by addressing all of them we will move towards that aim.

The noble Lord highlighted the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act, which is interesting. One of the benefits of conducting the VNR has been working closely with the devolved Administrations, which has enabled us to learn more about how different parts of the UK are progressing on this issue. In Bristol, for example, the local authority has its own delivery plan for the SDGs, and the Welsh Government is benefiting from the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act. The conclusions and the next steps will outline how we will further strengthen the implementation of the goals domestically. I am meeting the International Relations Minister of Wales next week, and I look forward to discussing it further with her. I will be happy to sit down with the noble Lord and discuss his ideas further.

My noble friend Lady Manzoor and the noble Lord, Lord Collins, highlighted the importance of nutrition. Indeed, they are co-chairing an APPG to make sure that that is high on the agenda. Nutrition underpins many of the SDGs. It is one of our best buys at DfID and it remains an important focus for us. It is a foundation for inclusive development, underpinning about 12 of the 17 SDGs, but the challenge to prevent malnutrition is getting much greater, not least because of climate change.

My noble friend quite rightly highlighted the opportunity we have ahead of the Nutrition for Growth summit in Tokyo next year. We are working very closely with the Government of Japan on the preparation for that summit to make sure that we have a high level of ambition for it, that it succeeds and that we involve Governments, the UN, civil society and the private sector so that they take action genuinely to accelerate the reductions in malnutrition that we want to see. We are also collectively building the resilience of health and food systems so that malnutrition can be prevented and treated effectively in the face of increasing climate threats.

The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, focused on the domestic part of goal 1 and goal 2. The challenges of food insecurity are tied in with goal 1. We are trying to shape some future evidence-based policy in this area. A review is under way on the drivers of foodbank use and it will be published before the end of the year. I am pleased the noble Baroness highlighted the breakfast programme. I agree with her that of course no child should be too hungry to learn. I take her point on confidence about funding, and I will take back her points to the DfE and perhaps come back to her on that in detail. That was goal 2. The noble Baroness also spoke to goal 1, on ending poverty. Of course, there is more we must do to tackle the long-term drivers of poverty. Since the financial crisis, we have faced a challenging position. We will continue to monitor poverty trends closely and to develop further measurements in order really to understand the causes and consequences of poverty and solutions to it.

My noble friend Lady Stroud rightly highlighted the importance of having the right statistics for such understanding. As part of our commitment to tackle the root causes and as my noble friend said, we announced last week that we will publish experimental statistics in 2020 based on the work undertaken by the Social Metrics Commission. On my noble friend’s point on embedding this properly in DWP, she is quite right, and I am pleased to say that there is now an individual in DWP, and in all departments, who is responsible for embedding the SDP within the department. I will take it upon myself to send my noble friend’s words to that person.

Many noble Lords asked whether we are moving quickly enough to deliver the SDGs and whether the Government are working closely together enough to do so. I think it is fair to say that that is a common criticism I have heard since taking on this role. We are making progress in improving the granularity and coherence of planning to achieve the SDPs. The Government are well aware that more needs to be done in this area. Earlier this year the Minister for implementation held a workshop on this with key stakeholders to invite views on how to do this better. We have seen an improvement in the recently published single departmental plans and we will be taking the recommendations forward for the 2021 plans, but there is some way to go. The noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, mentioned Germany. We need to look at international examples to see what we can learn and how we can replicate that.

The noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked about dates for the plans. I am afraid that I will again have to disappoint him. We have very recently published this and we are now speaking to people following the publication and building up the plans to get something in place.

The noble Lord, Lord Loomba, spoke of the remaining extreme poverty and hunger around the world. More than 780 million people still live below the international poverty line. We think the way to try to end extreme poverty and aid dependency is through inclusive economic growth, jobs, investment and trade. Social protection is important in reducing poverty and vulnerability and in helping people to meet their basic needs, pay for health and education services and build resilience to shocks. We are working closely with partner Governments in more than 20 countries on social protection and are helping them to increase the coverage, quality and sustainability of their systems.

The noble Lord, Lord Loomba, also spoke of the importance of leaving no one behind, both internationally and, of course, here at home. Once again, the UK was instrumental in including “leave no one behind” as an overarching principle within the goals. That included the promise to try to reach the furthest behind first, both in our international development work and domestically. Our VNR includes a stand-alone chapter on “leave no one behind”. Each of the 17 chapters on goals also include examples of how the UK is working to meet the promise to leave no one behind but, given the overarching principle, the more we can embed the SDGs within the department, the more we will be able to address that issue.

My noble friend Lady Verma spoke about the importance of data. I fully agree that data will be key to understanding how we and the rest of the world are progressing towards the SDGs. I was pleased to meet my noble friend recently to discuss the work of UN Women UK and I hope to meet the head of UN Women next week in New York. My noble friend asked whether we are moving quickly enough: my answer is no, I do not think we are. That is why we need to work with organisations such as UN Women UK to do so.

I am pleased to hear that the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, will be presenting her report to the UN next week. She mentioned the importance of sexual and reproductive health and rights; I agree that resources are desperately needed. We lead the world in our long-term support for comprehensive sexual and reproductive health and rights, from tackling HIV to family planning and to FGM. I firmly believe that women and girls have the fundamental right to make their own informed choices. We are the second largest bilateral donor on family planning and we are proud to work closely with the UNFPA on that. Following this debate, I will be going to the population day event downstairs, where I will be talking about the importance of our maintaining that leading voice on SHRR and standing firm in the face of the global rollback on women’s rights.

The noble Baroness also highlighted the horrific consequences of violence against children. We continue to support the global partnership and the Safe to Learn campaign and are pleased to see a clear, growing momentum and awareness on the importance of ending violence. There is still a funding gap around that; we will be encouraging other donors to step in and fill it. If we are truly dedicated to reaching SDG 16.2 we need to be much more ambitious and aim to get transformational levels of funding on this issue.

The noble Lord, Lord Rees, and the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, rightly highlighted climate. As the noble Earl said, there is no planet B; we are increasingly recognising this reality. We also need to see innovation in technology, as the noble Lord, Lord Rees, pointed out. We have legislated for net zero by 2050; tackling climate change is, of course, a priority. We have committed to £5.8 billion of climate finance, but there is much more to do. I hope we will succeed in our bid to host COP.

If I am allowed, I will take two more minutes to try to get through this. On technology, the noble Lord, Lord Rees, highlighted the importance of research. We spend 3% of our budget on research; we need to share that with other countries. I very much liked the analogy of my noble friend Lady Stroud, when she spoke of the SDGs being seen as the North Star. I will keep that in mind as we continue to work to achieve them. I agree with her point on safety and security. We have long supported progress around the world towards peaceful and more just societies. We played a key role in negotiating goal 16. As I said, in 2018 we doubled our contribution to the UN Peacebuilding Fund. We also launched our National Action Plan for Women, Peace and Security, recognising that important link to goal 5. We will continue to work in this area, both on violence against women and girls and on peace and justice more generally.

I am sorry to hear that the noble Lord, Lord Collins, feels this is a missed opportunity but I welcome his constructive criticism. I have touched on a few of the points he raised. He is absolutely right that we need to raise awareness of these goals and to use the VNR and SDG summit as opportunities to do so. We are having a national conversation, pushing out awareness of the goals as best we can. We are working with businesses, the financial industry and local authorities; it is absolutely a shared endeavour and action will be required from everyone to deliver them.

We have actively consulted the trade unions. Their input was particularly valuable in relation to goal 8, which focuses on economic growth and employment. We have engaged with the TUC and other organisations. As I said before, we need to continue this. Following the publication of the VNR, DfID officials met TUC colleagues last week as part of that ongoing engagement. We will continue that engagement, as we will continue engagement with faith groups, local authorities and, indeed, everyone.

I am out of time. I apologise as there is much I have not yet covered, but I will follow up in writing. My main takeaway from this debate is a heartening one. I thank everyone again for taking part. The Committee is evidently united in understanding how much the goals in international development matter and represent an investment in the world around us. They are a moral imperative in this country. Every single one of us must individually do our bit to help the most vulnerable people in the world, and the goals help us to do so.