International Development Policies

Lord Lawson of Blaby Excerpts

Thursday 19th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lawson of Blaby (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure that the whole House was delighted with the news last month that the Nobel prize for economics had been awarded to a British economist, Professor Angus Deaton. It was awarded for his work on global poverty, on which he is the world’s leading expert. I commend to all noble Lords who have participated in this debate his best-known book, The Great Escape, which I suspect many have not read. I commend it in particular to my noble friend who will be winding up in the debate, and I hope that she will draw it to the attention of her boss, the Secretary of State.

I should like to end this very brief intervention in the gap by quoting, in his own words, Professor Deaton’s conclusion in the book on official foreign aid:

“While some of this aid has clearly done good—and I think the case for assistance to fight disease such as HIV/AIDS or smallpox is strong—I have come to believe that most external aid is doing more harm than good. If it is undermining countries’ chance to grow—as I believe it is—there is no argument for continuing it on the grounds that ‘we must do something’. The something that we should do is to stop”.