Labour and International Development
Five years ago last month Nelson Mandela challenged world leaders to make poverty history before a crowd in Trafalgar Square. "Sometimes it falls upon a generation to be great," he told those assembled. "You can be that great generation."
Here in Scotland, In the UK and across the world this helped launch the Make Poverty History campaign – one of the biggest grassroots movements ever seen.
Over the years we have campaigned together to make poverty history and I know as I look out at the faces here tonight just how many of you are deeply committed to see an end to global poverty.
I have always been ready to praise the unstinting work of the voluntary organisations and campaigns dedicated to ending world poverty – I am really proud of you and the work you do. But tonight I am here to tell you that I am also very proud of my party's record on International Development – Labour's record
Labour's Record
Since being elected in 1997 Labour has given a high priority to Aid – I have had the privilege of bringing Claire Short to Ayr when she was DfID Secretary of State, and my colleague George Foulkes when he was her deputy. Since the launch of Make Poverty History, the Labour government has continued to lead the way in delivering on the hope of that day. Fundamental to the UK's commitments in 2005 was the target of spending 0.7% of gross national income on official development assistance (ODA) by 2013. I have the picture to prove it – me standing with Sir Bob Geldof and a placard emblazoned with the 0.7%. The 'long and the short of it' indeed!
The commitment was first made in 2004 by Gordon Brown (as Chancellor) and Tony Blair, was in the 2005 Labour manifesto, and was key to securing commitments to increase aid from the EU and G8 during the Make Poverty History campaign in 2005.
Thanks to Labour, the UK is already well on track to meeting the EU commitment to provide 0.56% per cent of our gross national income as aid by 2010, and 0.7% by 2013.
Considerable increases in global aid levels are needed in order to meet the UN-agreed Millennium Development Goals by 2015 – which are mostly off-track.
Around the world, there are still more than a billion people living in extreme poverty, forced to exist on less than $1.25 a day. The World Bank estimates that up to 100 million people are at risk of being pushed into lives of extreme poverty, so our concern for those living in poverty cannot end at our national borders.
We have achieved so much already. Aid increases and debt cancellation have helped to get 40 million more children into school, while the number of people with access to AIDS treatment has increased from just 100,000 to over 4 million. The proportion of the world's population living in poverty has fallen from a third to a quarter thanks to a combination of both aid and trade.
In just the last year alone, thanks to the UK's aid, over 100,000 teachers have been trained, more than three million children have been vaccinated against measles, a million people provided with clean water, seven million protected by anti-malaria bednets and more than 12 million given access to better sanitation.
But we have more to do, to help the nine million children who are still dying from preventable diseases each year and the 70 million children who are still denied the opportunity to go to school.
UK aid to Africa is on track to increase from £1.3 billion in 2004 to 3.4 billion in 2010
UK funding has helped more than seven million people in sub-Saharan Africa gain access to clean water and sanitation between 2004-08
More than 80,000 child deaths there have been prevented with the delivery of 14.6 million bed nets to tackle malaria. These are part of a pledge by Gordon Brown in 2008 of 20 million bednets by the end of this year. I don't know if you saw the moving piece on Sports Relief last week when Chris Moyles was devastated at the death of the little children dying from malaria right in front of his eyes.
And we have helped an additional 2 million children attend school in Mozambique in recent years.
A New International Development Bill
Labour has now introduced a draft Bill to Parliament which would make our commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of gross national income on official development assistance from 2013 legally binding. We will be the first country in the G8/G20 to introduce such a law.
The Bill would introduce a new duty on the Secretary of State for International Development to meet the target – and to be held accountable to Parliament in the event that it was not met.
Why is this not a full Bill?
Publishing a Bill in draft form is normal and enables consultation and pre-legislative scrutiny before a Bill is issued formally. Given the shortness of the current Parliamentary session, and the rest of the full legislative programme – it was not expected that there would be enough time for Parliament to debate a full Bill before dissolving for a General Election.
The Bill has however been considered and debated by the International Development Select Committee. An early full legislative slot has been sought for the period following the General Election, and would be prioritised by a newly elected Labour government should we be returned.
To harness public support for the new law and to help show that people still care about our commitments to the world's poorest people, we are asking people to back it online at www.globalpovertypromise.com
High profile celebrities including Davina McCall, Mariella Frostrup, Annie Lennox and Tony Robinson have also shown their support in a special film which you can view at www.globalpovertypromise.com . and all the key aid agencies are supporting the Bill.
Let me address some important questions flowing from all this –
Can we reach a political consensus on this?
I would dearly love to see that happen but the Conservatives have a bad track record here. I cannot forget that they halved the aid budget during their time in office while Labour has trebled it since 1997
The Tories say they support the 0.7% target, but would transfer aid money to other government departments – like tackling climate change- and export privatisation to poor countries.
David Cameron has also said he does not think a law is necessary, and they so far refuse to say whether they would introduce a full Bill if elected. I would expect the Liberal Democrats to back a law but so far they haven't committed to that.
Another problem lies just below the surface when you scratch it - Tory candidates don't agree with their leadership on overseas aid. 96% of Tory candidates surveyed by conservativehome.com website said that they did not prioritise protecting the aid budget from cuts. Other high profile Tories have called for cuts in aid spending.
"I have never agreed with David Cameron's decision to ringfence spending on international aid… it is a profligate government department… more than £1 billion of our money is being p****d down the drain…So, George Osborne, what's it to be? £1 billion off the DfID budget? Good man."
Iain Dale, Iain Dale's Diary, 4 September 2009 (well known blogger and likely Tory MP after the election)
And the most recent personality in Scotland to back the Tories (the only one come to think of it) Tessa Hartmann, the founder of Scottish Fashion Week- questioned the Aid budget and offered the advice 'we should all be more selfish'
Will the UK public support continued increases in aid during an economic downturn?
In the early days of recession it was hoped that the financial crisis would be contained within developed economies.This hope proved to be unfounded and there is additional fear that aid flow may suffer in the aftermath of the crisis. The World Bank has stated that risk aversion,a reassessment of growth prospects and the need for firms and investors in high income countries to strengthen their balance sheets resulted in large scale repatriation of capital from developing countries.
As ever emerging economies are suffering from a crisis that was not of their making.The Africa Progress Panel has said:
' The Financial meltdown that evolved into an economic crisis has now become a development crisis. Combined with the food crisis, the volatility in fuel costs and climate change, it threatens to reverse Africa's recent progress and endangers people's lives.The prospect of reaching the MDGs by 2015 , already a cause for serious concern , now looks even more distant.
Losses of $50 billion in sub Saharan Africa and $750 billion in the developing countries as a whole were estimated in the financial year 2008-9.
And despite various international agreements we are already seeing substantial cuts in aid budgets even from some countries who have pledged to meet the 0.7% target ON AID.
Ireland, Latvia , Italy have cut budgets and both Germany and Spain have been criticised on the quality of their aid by the European body which overseas DEBT AND DEVELOPMENT . (Eurodad)
As I have said the UK has reaffirmed our commitment however the UK's aid could be less now as a result of the recession lowering the Gross Domestic Income and exchange rate movements.
So the prospects of reaching the global Gleneagles target of $130 billion per year by 2010 are uncertain. The additional money needed to meet this target is a fraction of the support provided to rescuefinancial institutions in rich countries and a tiny proportion of their fiscal stimjulus packages.
I believe that the crisis calls for exceeding the Gleneagles commitments to help poor countries increased needs.
For the moment the G20 have proposed $250 billion allocation of Special Drawing ights via the IMF to provide liquidity to thwe global economic system. Developing countries will rwceive $100 billion of this.
But there has always been strong UK support for aid to the poorest countries. The case for development aid is stronger than ever during a recession, because it is the poorest people in the poorest countries who are least able to respond to financial and economic shocks. Keeping our promises is not just a moral imperative, but in an increasingly interdependent world – in our common interest.
It's easy to be cynical about people and, yes – there are many selfish prejudiced ignorant people out there. But there are also millions of decent caring human beings who will respond to strong progressive leadership – just look at events like Sports Relief and how much money people were prepared to pledge in a recession
In conclusion
As I said at the beginning we have campaigned together over the years to make poverty history. Those of you who have taken part in these campaigns should be proud of what you have achieved just as I am proud of what a Labour Government has done – goodness knows we have our faults and the public fan club for political parties is a bit lacking in the membership department at the moment. But I believe Labour has a good record on tackling poverty both at home and on the international front. And no party could have had better leadership in that crusade than that provided by the PM Gordon Brown. I dearly hope we will be able to go on working together towards achieving these goals in the years ahead.
