Global Poverty

Debate between Mary Macleod and Andrew Mitchell

Thursday 1st July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

I thank the hon. Lady for her comments. I will have a look at that report. On her first point about the role of women, I am coming to that directly in my remarks.

Doing the right thing with British aid is not just about saving money: it is about being honest and open about where our funding is going. Knowledge gives people the power to hold others—be they individuals, organisations or Governments—to account. That is why I have launched a new UK aid transparency guarantee that will help to make aid transparent not only to people in the UK but to those in recipient countries.

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Mitchell]

I am going to make a bit of progress, and then I will of course give way.

Building up civil society in the developing world is crucial to enabling citizens to hold their own political leaders to account. The transparency guarantee will help to create millions of independent aid watchdogs—people around the world who can see where aid is supposed to be going and shout if it does not get there. From January, we will publish full details of DFID projects and programmes on our website so that everyone can have access to information about where our funding is going and what it is intended to achieve. The simple act of publishing information can reduce the amount of corruption and waste, improve the quality of public services and increase public sector accountability.

I wish to make two further points about Britain’s bilateral aid programme. First, where it is relevant, in every country where DFID is active we will pay particular attention to the fight against malaria. It will be the responsibility of my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for International Development, whose involvement, expertise and knowledge in the matter is well known to the House. It is simply unconscionable that in this day and age, thousands of children and adults die every day from that completely preventable disease. If there were an outbreak of malaria in Europe it would immediately be stopped in its tracks. Reducing the burden of malaria in the developing world and focusing on the areas of highest infection will be an essential part of our programmes.

Secondly, we must extend far further choice for women over whether and when they have children. It is outrageous that today in sub-Saharan Africa, only 15% of women have access to modern methods of contraception. I simply lay this fact before the House: every year, 20 million women have unsafe abortions, and 70,000 of them, many still girls, die as a result. Some 215 million women around the world who want to use modern contraception do not have access to it. No statistic could more eloquently underline the importance of allowing women to choose whether to have children, and we will pursue that argument vigorously and single-mindedly.

I invite the House to consider the further point that in Niger, one of the poorest countries in the world, a population of 3 million in 1960 has grown to nearly 16 million today, and expert opinion judges that it will rise to nearly 60 million in the next 40 years. It is a country that suffers deeply from political, economic, climate and food insecurity. As I said last week in Washington, Britain will place women at the heart of our whole agenda for international development.

That subject is closely related to the Prime Minister’s insistence at the G8 last weekend on combined action on maternal and child mortality. As he made clear in Muskoka, a woman’s chances of dying in pregnancy and childbirth are one in 8,200 in the UK, whereas in Sierra Leone they are a stark one in eight. The resources agreed at the G8, including a significant contribution from the United Kingdom, should lead to an additional 1.3 million lives being saved.