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Column: GPP - United Kingdom
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Today was the State Opening of Parliament and the Queen’s speech, the day the Government (who write the content of the speech for the Queen) outlines it’s legislative priorities and plans for the next session of parliament. The last parliamentary session from 2010 until just a few weeks ago was one of the longest ever, so speculation in the past few weeks has been rife about what might be included and what would be left out. Whilst the headlines from the speech will be about Lords Reform and the Economy, for those of us interested in international efforts to help support the worlds poorest it was the Government’s surprise reaffirmation of their support for the 0.7% target which was truly surprising.
We have been campaigning and blogging on the importance of the 0.7% target for some time, and thanks to you, our supporters and campaigners not only were we able to give a personal thanks to the most important politicians in UK international development, but we helped persuade the government to become the first government in UK history to achieve our 40 year old international pledge to spend 0.7% of GNI on aid.
However, in the past few weeks there have been a number of papers reporting that the Government would be distancing themselves at this Queen’s speech from their promise to put 0.7% into law. Along with an article in yesterday’s Times that said that the ring fencing of international development assistance would soon be removed, few of us passionate about the UK’s lifesaving aid had much hope for today’s statement.
Whilst today the Government did stop short of a commitment to legislate on the issue, the fact that the Government did mention of 0.7% in the Queen’s speech at all gives us a further opportunity to continue to hold the Government to account and to push for them to keep their promise and put 0.7 in law. The fact it was mentioned at all today is a testament to the hard work of you, our supporters and campaigners who have repeatedly shared with your communities your passion about helping the world’s poorest, and have made sure that our elected officials can’t forget the promises they have made.
As Elisha London, our UK country director has said:
“We fully welcome the Government’s surprise reaffirming of their commitment to the 0.7% aid target in today’s Queen’s speech. Given the Government’s clear promises to enshrine this target in law and the cross party support this enjoys, we look forward to seeing the legislation imminently in this session of Parliament.”
As we have talked about before, we know that when spent well aid can achieve amazing results; for example over the last 25 years, polio cases have been reduced by 99%. With countries such as Australia and Canada cutting their development assistance budgets and breaking their international promises, if we are to reach that final 1% and finally end the debilitating disease of polio, then the UK’s must keep it’s promises on 0.7%.
It is remarkable that this government will for the first time in UK history spend 0.7% of GNI on international development. However, to remove the issue entirely from short term domestic political interests we must use today’s mention in the Queen’s speech to push on and ensure the Government keeps it’s promises to the world’s poorest and puts 0.7 into law.
*image taken from BBC News website |
Posted by Sam Bacon in Aid for column GPP - United Kingdom on May 9th, 16:04 |
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(This has also been posted on Left Foot Forward)
There's been much talk today about a new report from the House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs calling for the UK's target of spending 0.7% of GNI to be abandoned.
And as I have blogged about previously, and as the #powerofpoint7 hashtag demonstrates, there is much public support for the UK providing lifesaving aid, clearly showing this report to be out of step with much public opinion. But more than that, as Bill Gates, UNICEF UK President Lord Ashdown, Oxfam, Save the Children, the ONE Campaign, WaterAid, Christian Aid, World Vision UK and the VSO have already said - the calls from this report would not only endanger the lives of millions of the world's poorest people, but they are quite simply misleading and wrong.
Contrary to one of the report's primary assertions, the internationally agreed 0.7% target is not an arbitrary figure; according to the United Nations it is the figure needed to ensure that globally there is enough funding to meet the UN Millennium Development Goals and provide essential support for 1.4 billion people to lift themselves out of extreme poverty.
Thanks to ONE's recent report, and a DFID statement after a recent Global Poverty Project campaign showing public support for the 0.7 target, we know that honouring our country's promises to the world's poor will mean:
- Over the next few years more than 60 million children will be vaccinated against preventable diseases (more than the entire UK population);
- Nearly 78 million people will be able to access the basics needed to start a business and get on the path of lifting themselves out of poverty;
- With 99% eradication, Polio is now left in only three countries in the world and over the next few years our aid could help fund efforts to get it out of these countries and end polio and its debilitating effects for good.
These results are simply not achievable if as a country we follow the Committee's report and walk away from the international aid commitments we have made.
However, it's important to be clear; calling for a commitment to spend more on aid does not mean how it is spent or what it is spent on is a secondary consideration. Only when aid is spent effectively will it achieve real results and make a difference for millions of people. The report is quite simply wrong when it misguidedly suggests that the 0.7% target encourages a move away from a consideration of value for money and transparency in our aid spending. Quite simply we need both quantity AND quality in our efforts.
As Eric Gutierrez, Senior Governance Adviser for Christian Aid has made clear "In Scandinavian countries, where the 0.7% threshold has been achieved, the discussion has shifted away from how much to give, to focus instead on how well it could be used". Anyone who is interested in supporting the 1.4 billion people in extreme poverty as they work their way to a sustainable future is also deeply passionate about tackling corruption and increasing transparency in the aid and money that we give.
The most effective results in ending extreme poverty and helping save lives will come if NGOs and partners in the developing world know that our commitments will not waiver and funding streams will be maintained until the end of projects. Maintaining 0.7 allows this, and so helps us reach our ultimate goal of supporting people to a position out of extreme poverty and to be no longer in need of aid.
The chair of the Economic Affairs Committee has said that putting the 0.7% target in law, as all three mainstream political parties support, "would deprive future governments of the flexibility to respond to changing circumstances at home and abroad", but it is exactly for this reason that all parties support it. Putting the target in law removes the politics from the issue of helping stabilise communities and save lives, and prevents short term domestic interests stopping our long term International commitments. To see the end of extreme poverty, this type of cross-party agreement on 0.7 is critical. Today's report was a backwards step in the process of giving a hand up, not a hand out, to the worlds poorest people. |
Posted by Sam Bacon in Aid for column GPP - United Kingdom on Mar 29th, 14:35 |
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This piece was originally published in the Huffington Post.
We’ve all heard the adage that if you say something often enough, it becomes true.
Well, recently some parts of the media seem to have adopted this approach to trashing foreign aid, saying aid doesn’t work, and the public don’t want it.
This is dangerous. It’s dangerous because it’s wrong, and because could cost people their lives.
It’s wrong because aid can and is making a huge difference. Millions of lives saved by the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria in the last decade, 4 million lives that could be saved in the next 5 years by the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation, 40 million more kids going to school than a decade ago.
It’s wrong because the public, when they hear these facts and see personal stories of transformation, get on board. The huge sums raised by charities are increasingly driven by such positive stories of progress. Comic Relief raised more than ever in 2011, and the public’s response to the East Africa famine was unprecedented.
The cynics in the media say that they public want foreign aid from the government cut – but they always forget to finish the sentence. They want it cut from what they think it is, anywhere from 15 to 25% of government spending, to 5 or 10%. Aid spending in the UK, USA, Australia, Canada or New Zealand is around 1% of government spending – a fraction of what people think it is, and a fraction of what people want it to be.
The danger in all of this is that these myths, left unchallenged, will have a real impact on the lives of the world’s poor.
When the media misreport on aid – saying that it doesn’t work and people don’t want it, and the public start to believe it. Members of the public repeat what they read in the papers to MPs, who in turn start to think that the public wants less aid. The media report on MP concerns over aid based on their own reports, and put pressure on the government to spend less.
The government spends less – cutting funding to life-saving interventions like vaccines for some of the world’s poorest children, reducing money set aside to respond to emergencies like last year’s famine, and the world’s poorest suffer.
As a movement of people who care about fighting extreme poverty, we cannot accept the demand of some media editors to balance our budget on the back’s of the world’s poor.
It’s a demand that’s based on untruth and misinformation, and we have to stand up and do something about it.
We need to take the proof that aid works out to our communities, and we need to show our politicians and media the full story when it comes to aid and development.
We need to argue that aid can work wonders – when it’s spent well. We have to acknowledge that aid isn’t always spent well, that corruption is an issue, and that we need to ask tough questions about value for money and impact – and that these are issues we should debate, not excuses to avoid giving aid.
We should be proud that our government has so far stood up the negative press, and kept their promises to the world’s poor and us on foreign aid. But we can’t expect them to withstand the barrage without more support from us.
As I write this, I’m on a train back from Plymouth in the south-west of England, having just spoken with a group of students about exactly this. They got it, as have people and communities all over the country. At the Global Poverty Project, we’ve spoken face to face with more than 100,000 people in the last two years, and the lesson we’ve learnt is clear:
Take the facts and the stories out to people, suggest a course of action, and they can do the rest.
 Join me in writing to your local MP to say thanks for the aid they’re giving, and urge them to keep up the good work by helping to save 3 million more lives from malaria.
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.png) Today we launch the 2012 Live Below the Line campaign. Braving the freezing conditions, over 40 Live Below the Line supporters took to Piccadilly Circus and joined Harry Potter star Bonnie Wright at a special dinner party with a difference. Sat ready for an elegant dinner, volunteers were instead treated to a single raw vegetable to highlight the lack of choice available to the 1.4 billion people living off less than £1 per day around the world.
The 2012 campaign is being led by six very influential UK charity partners, including UNICEF, Salvation Army, Christian Aid, RESULTS UK, Restless Development and Malaria No More UK. Over the next six months, Live Below the Line will be challenging thousands of participants who for 5 days will have £5 for all their food and drink, raising £500,000 for anti-poverty initiatives around the globe.
You can pre-register your interest using the form below or find out more here.
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On June 15 2010, Ken Clarke was appointed as the UK’s international anti-corruption champion.
Personally appointed by the Prime Minister, Ken Clarke promised to work closely with colleagues, authorities and agencies to develop a strategy to combat international corruption.
According to him: 'The champion role sends out a clear message that the UK coalition government will not tolerate bribery or corruption.'
As well as sending out that clear message, Ken Clarke also promised that he would work ‘closely with colleagues across departments, devolved administrations, law enforcement, prosecution authorities and regulatory agencies to ensure a coherent and joined-up approach to combat international corruption.
To date we’re yet to see a ‘joined-up approach to combat international corruption’.
In short, a plan.
We’re calling on Ken Clarke to develop a plan
This is disappointing. Corruption is real and its effects are disastrous. As the Bond Governance Group argue in their anti-corruption paper,
‘Corruption has devastating effects on developing economies and their citizens’ quality of life. Its cost in Africa alone has been estimated at US$148 billion a year, representing 25% of the continent’s GDP. Corruption undermines economic growth rates and cripples public services, as money which should be destined for re-investment and public expenditure finds its way into private bank accounts, often abroad.’
Too often many consider the existence of corruption as a reason to do nothing. The reality is, there’s much we can do in the UK to combat corruption.
The paper identified a number of areas and opportunities that the UK has to fight corruption. For example, the first three that the paper raises include:
- Illegitimate payments: bribery of foreign public officials
- Lack of transparency in legitimate revenue payments by companies
- Illicit and harmful financial flows out of developing countries
These three issues demonstrate that there is much the UK can do to fight corruption. They are issues that deserve a ‘joined-up approach’ to address.
And they are the issues that we are campaigning on.
First, on July 1 the Bribery Act will come into force. This is a much needed update to Britain’s anti-bribery laws. However – the Act itself has been undermined by the guidance notes that the government released. By opening up huge loopholes the government has weakened the ability of the Act to address the very thing it is supposed to.
We’re calling on Ken Clarke to properly implement the Bribery Act
Second, transparency in the natural resource industry is critical to fighting poverty. Too often the wealth generated by the natural resources doesn’t go towards improving the lives of the very owners of the resources – the citizens themselves.
It was encouraging then to hear George Osborne agree that there needs to be greater transparency in the natural resource industries.
"As we enter a new decade when the resources of Africa are going to be heavily developed, I strongly believe it's in everyone's interests that mining companies and others operate to the highest standards. That's the way to ensure some of the world's poorest benefit from the wealth that lies in the ground beneath them. That's why I've raised the issue of new international rules at the G20 in Paris - the first time that's happened. And that's why Vince Cable and I will be arguing for an European agreement that matches the new standards just set in the US.”
Third, illicit financial flows rob countries of the funds they need to develop. Global Financial Integrity have calculated that between 1970 and 2008 Africa had lost $854 billion in illicit financial flows. That was the conservative estimate. The most generous estimate put the figure at $1.8 trillion.
Critically, they argue that our financial systems promote, perpetuate and exacerbate this problem. As their report points out
This massive flow of illicit money out of Africa is facilitated by a global shadow financial system comprising tax havens, secrecy jurisdictions, disguised corporations, anonymous trust accounts, fake foundations, trade mispricing and money laundering techniques.
Whilst they can appear overwhelming, the common thread running through these examples are the opportunities they provide for us to get involved, take action and demand a better outcome for the world’s poor.
Ultimately, overcoming extreme poverty will not occur by throwing loose change at the problem. Rather, it is the systems and structures that keep people poor that need to be changed.
And that’s where you and I step in.
That’s why we’re campaigning for Ken Clarke to announce the government’s strategy to combat corruption.
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