Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what recent assessment she has made of the value for money of the provision of development assistance to Bangladesh for freedom of expression and political engagement.

The Strengthening Political Participation phase 2 (SPP2) programme works to track, mitigate and prevent violence in politics and elections. The social and economic costs to families and communities are very high - before and after the 2014 elections, almost 900 people were killed and over 38,000 were injured across Bangladesh. Whilst the SPP2 programme cannot guarantee an end to violence in politics, it makes an important contribution to this aim.

The SPP2 programme is subject to annual review which includes an annual Value for Money (VfM) assessment. The first and most recent annual review of SPP2 was conducted in April 2018 and is published online via DFID’s web portal for Bangladesh. Overall the VfM propositions made in the business case remain on track.