International Development Policies

Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale Excerpts

Thursday 19th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale (Lab)]

My Lords, before I address the substantive issue of the effectiveness of this country’s international development work, I want to draw attention to my various charitable interests in the register and also to say that I wish the conventions of your Lordships’ Chamber allowed me to describe the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, as “my noble friend”. I greatly admire his commitment to these issues, and the passion he brings to the Chamber regularly in addressing them makes your Lordships’ House a much better place.

I want to address two issues today. The first concerns the sustainable development goals agreed by the United Nations in September. I think that these are really exciting times for international development and I congratulate the Government on the role they have played in bringing these new goals about. I hope that their commitment drives these goals forward and that we are able to move forward in a way that, on a cross-party basis, we have done regularly over recent years.

These new sustainable development goals give us a chance to address important issues that were ignored by the millennium development goals, such as the business environment, taxation systems and the role of the private sector in creating jobs. Not only do they put the role of women and the education and liberation of girls more fundamentally at the centre of the strategy, not only do they look at resilience in areas affected by natural disasters and regular emergencies, to ensure that they are better prepared for the impact that such events have on development, but they provide a wider, comprehensive package for development. This should encourage us that in 15 years’ time we can have made further real inroads into tackling extreme poverty worldwide.

I want to address one specific issue within all that, which we have discussed before in your Lordships’ Chamber and commented on in relation to the Government’s policy, which has been, since 2010, a policy of allocating roughly one-third of the international development budget to fragile and conflict-affected states. Actions have been taken not only to improve the governance of those states and development within those states but to try to prevent conflict and further fragility in the future. I see that the Prime Minister has said this week that we might now move to 50% of the development budget being allocated in this way. In principle, I would not have an objection to that.

I believe that the new goal 16 agreed as part of the sustainable development goals is a very important addition to the international framework, highlighting the importance of peace and justice. If we are to secure real development for the long term, I believe that that goal is critical. If the UK is to contribute to international success on that goal, then, yes, perhaps a higher proportion of the budget should go towards conflict-affected and fragile states—but we must not use such a commitment simply to add resources to the old way of doing humanitarian relief, for example.

In these humanitarian camps, important as they are, it is no longer the case that water, shelter and food are enough. We need to start educating the children in these camps so that the next generation are not disillusioned, angry and willing to take up the fight in the way that their fathers and uncles appear to be back home. We also need to ensure that in these fragile states we do not just support NGOs that implement development programmes that allow us to add high numbers to our achievements, but that we create the kind of legitimate, independent institutions that give people hope for a peaceful and just future. If we address those issues, an increase in the proportion of the international development budget allocated to issues of peace and justice in fragile and conflict-affected states would be money well spent.