Oral Answers to Questions

Tobias Ellwood Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr O'Brien]

I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for identifying the key issue of FGM. We will certainly consider carefully what he has said, as we look to roll forward the programmes, in order to ensure that we deal in the most effective way by bearing down not only on the activity, which is clearly intolerable, but on the societal and cultural drivers that lie behind it. That is what will be most influential in driving the funds to help the programmes.

[Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con)]

9. What steps he is taking to ensure maximum effectiveness in respect of the aid provided under his Department’s programmes.

[The Secretary of State for International Development (Mr Andrew Mitchell)]

It is essential that we spend every pound of aid effectively. We will do that through rigorous independent evaluation, greater transparency and an unremitting focus on results. We will transform the transparency of aid information, ensuring accountability to UK taxpayers and people in developing countries. The UK will review all aid to focus it on results and on outputs.

[Mr Ellwood]

I am grateful for that reply and welcome my right hon. Friend to his new appointment. He stressed that Afghanistan is our main foreign challenge. How will he ensure that the money that is poured into Ministries in Kabul is able to make its way all the way down to the front line—to those communities that need it most?

[Mr Mitchell]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who knows a great deal about those issues. We have looked very carefully at the mechanism for delivering that aid, which is vital to the development effort in Afghanistan, and independent analysis suggests that the World Bank trust fund, which, as he will appreciate, pays out on the basis of receipts for work carried out by the Government and Government employees, is a highly effective way of getting money through to the front line.