Sarah Champion: UK budget must restore stability to foreign aid

A boy sits on boxes as Palestinians gather to receive aid, including food supplies provided by World Food Program (WFP), outside a United Nations distribution center, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, August 24, 2024. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
opinion

A boy sits on boxes as Palestinians gather to receive aid, including food supplies provided by World Food Program (WFP), outside a United Nations distribution center, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, August 24, 2024. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

When it unveils its first budget on Oct. 30, Britain’s Labour government must remember that inaction on aid comes at a price

Sarah Champion is MP for Rotherham and Chair of the British parliament’s International Development Committee.

“A world free from poverty, on a liveable planet.”

That is the ambition driving the U.K.’s new approach to international aid, Development Minister Anneliese Dodds said in a key policy speech this month.

Setting out some of the government’s key priorities, Dodds said U.K. aid would seek to tackle the climate and nature crisis, champion reform of multilateral institutions, connect British expertise to global partners and advocate for the power of international development.

An ambitious list, certainly, and one that will cheer those in the sector desperate for a hopeful vision of the future. 

But the question remains: where will the resources for such a programme come from? As Budget Day approaches, Dodds was clear that Britain faces a tough economic situation.

But as much as there is an obvious cost attached to spending on international aid in the current climate, the cost of inaction is far greater. After several years of instability, this week’s budget is a real opportunity to restore certainty to the aid budget for several years into the future. That certainty is something the sector is desperate for.

In 2020, the Conservative government reduced overseas aid from 0.7% to 0.5% of gross national income (GNI) to free up cash for domestic spending during COVID-19, slashing billions from programmes supporting the world's poorest.

This new Labour government has pledged to restore overseas development spending to 0.7% of economic output when the fiscal situation allows but has given no timeframe.

More than 100 British NGOs have called for bold action in the budget to maintain U.K. overseas aid at current levels and avoid withdrawing vital services from millions of vulnerable people worldwide.

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Not an optional extra

The need for international aid is greater than ever in an increasingly unstable world.

A report published by the University of Gothenburg this year highlighted that a staggering 5.7 billion people – 71% of the world’s population – now live in autocracies. This figure was only 48% ten years ago, something that should give us pause for thought.

International aid should not be an optional extra, called upon only when the economy is booming and times are good. Rather, it is a fundamental pillar of the U.K.’s positive role in the world.

We must also avoid the easy temptation to simply wait for problems to arrive on our doorstep, and hope that throwing cash at them will constitute a solution. To do so amounts to sticking our fingers in a dyke once water is already rushing over the top.

From 2019 to 2024, I chaired parliament’s International Development Committee (IDC) and I am honoured to have been re-elected to that role. That role has given me a clear sense of the current state of U.K. aid: its successes, failures and challenges.

I have seen first-hand how short-term thinking led governments to pilfer money earmarked for aid to finance the costs of hosting refugees at home, rather than tackling the problems forcing these desperate people to flee their homes in the first place.

Last year, the previous IDC published a report on aid spending in Britain. It found that while the Home Office’s use of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office budget to pay for hotels for refugees in Britain was within the letter of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) rules on aid spending, it was far from the spirit of those rules.

Australia, for example, does not count the costs of supporting refugees at home towards its aid spend, while Sweden sets an upper limit. It is understandable that some of our partners have expressed concern about the U.K.’s approach. 

Not only does this approach undermine Britain’s reputation among our peers, it also jeopardises the financial stability of our aid programmes.

In 2022, as the Home Office was given a blank cheque for the foreign aid budget, spending on “non-essential” aid was paused for four months.

It was shocking to hear Andrew Mitchell, then international development minister, describe the department’s budget as being at times “out of control”.

Stability and predictability of the aid budget is crucial. With more certainty, we can offer far greater security to the individuals and organisations who rely on our support. Better planning means both better results and value for money.

Now is the moment for the finance minister to restore Britain’s international reputation by showing a long-term commitment to aid, proving we are once again a country to be relied upon.


Any views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author and not of Context or the Thomson Reuters Foundation.


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  • Government aid
  • War and conflict



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