Humanitarian Emergency Response Review

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. We are going to consult about the pre-qualification process, to ensure that that does not happen. The fund will be there to help those who are already on the ground, so that in the first 72 hours, when action is critical for reasons that the House will acknowledge, we can ensure that money is not a barrier to immediate and effective action. I therefore think I can reassure him on that point.

The GAVI pledging conference that took place yesterday will have a direct effect on disaster relief, because it will prevent children from getting sick. We should all be enormously proud of the leadership of Britain and the Prime Minister. As a result of the replenishment conference exceeding its target yesterday by some $600 million, we will be able to vaccinate more than a quarter of a billion children over the next five years in the poorest parts of the world and save nearly 5 million lives.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I welcome the Secretary of State’s thinking on a standing faculty for emergency response, including NGOs. Will he assure us that there will be no tension in practice between the follow-through on the Ashdown review and the follow-through on the previous DFID reviews, which put particular emphasis on buying results? The Ashdown review particularly emphasises resilience, innovation and science, and humanitarian space in areas of conflict, the benefits of which are not always as quantifiable as those of some other measures. Will the Secretary of State ensure that the Ashdown recommendations are not casualties of the results-buying emphasis of previous reviews?

[Mr Mitchell]

All three reviews to which the hon. Gentleman refers focus directly on the results that we are achieving, not only in delivering real value for money to British taxpayers, whose money we are deploying, but for those whom we are trying to help. Whereas the Ashdown review was a review given to the Government, to which I am responding today, the first two were reviews by the Government. If the hon. Gentleman looks carefully at all three, he will find that they are seamlessly joined by the common interest of ensuring that international development work from Britain is more effective and buys yet greater results.