Oral Statement by the Secretary of State for International Development

13th July 2006

The White Paper on International Development

Related pages: New White Paper: making governance work for the poor

With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement about the White Paper on International Development which I am publishing today. Copies of the White Paper, and of this statement, have been placed in the Vote Office.

At a time when the world has never been richer, in wealth and knowledge, pregnancy and childbirth claim the life of a woman every minute. Every day dirty water and bad sanitation claim the lives of 5,000 children. Every year, malaria kills one million people, tuberculosis 2 million people, and AIDS 3 million people.

Each one a death caused by poverty.

Last year the world came together and agreed to do something to change this. The G8 Summit at Gleneagles promised: more aid and debt cancellation, support to free education and health care, treatment for all with HIV and AIDS, and better ways of dealing with conflict.

We have made progress in the last 12 months but we have not yet made poverty history. There is still much to do, and this White Paper sets out our plans for the next 5 years.

In preparing it, we received over 600 submissions from around the world. I would like to thank honourable Members for their contributions and those of their constituents, as well as many others.

How countries progress and improve the lives of their citizens is a complex process, but we know that governance is fundamental to it. Development doesn’t happen without effective states, capable of delivering services to their citizens and helping economies to grow. States that respond to peoples’ needs and which, in turn, can be held to account. For all these reasons, good governance is at the heart of this White Paper.

While we will continue to help build the capacity of public institutions for good governance in developing countries, we will now do more at the grassroots to reinforce the demand for good governance. We will set up a new £100 million Governance and Transparency Fund to do this. It will support civil society, a free media, parliamentarians and trade unions in improving accountability.

To ensure that our aid is used to best effect, we will in future regularly assess the quality of governance, transparency and commitment to reducing poverty in the countries in which we work. We will publish these assessments, and will use them to help make decisions about our aid.

Recognising that bad governance and corruption are international problems too, we will:

- publish an annual UK Action Plan to tackle corruption affecting developing countries and report on progress every six months;
- set up a new unit to investigate money laundering and allegations of bribery affecting UK firms;
- help developing countries to track assets and carry out investigations;
- seek to expand, including through a resolution in the UN General Assembly, the successful Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative to other sectors such as construction, procurement, and health; and
- work with others to set international standards to tackle the trade in conflict resources, which fuels so much destruction.

We will also strengthen the implementation of the OECD Guidelines with new arrangements for the UK contact point, involving independent experts.

People cannot escape poverty if there is war and insecurity. We will therefore increase our efforts in fragile states, and invest more in at least ten countries where security is a major issue.

We will help with reintegrating ex-combatants, supporting access to justice, monitoring human rights, and reducing the spread of small arms, including through an international Arms Trade Treaty.

Peace and good governance are also essential for the economic growth needed to create jobs and raise incomes. We will support the Africa Infrastructure Consortium which has already helped to secure investment of £1.4 billion in a range of projects, and the Investment Climate Facility. We will double our funding for research in science and technology, agriculture, adapting to climate change, and new drugs and vaccines.

We will help poor people to get better access to markets to sell their goods and to finance to support their livelihoods.

And we will continue to press for a trade round that enables developing countries to earn their way out of poverty, while meeting our pledge to provide £100 million a year in aid-for-trade by 2010.

Everyone should have decent health care, education, water and sanitation, and social security when times are hard, and UK aid is already helping governments to bring these to more of their citizens.

With our aid rising to meet the UN 0.7% target by 2013, we will increase our spending on these public services to at least half of our bilateral aid budget.

We will make long-term commitments through ten year plans so that countries can make long-term decisions to hire staff, build the schools and clinics needed, and abolish user fees.

We will increase spending on education to £1 billion a year by 2010, and having doubled our spending on water and sanitation in Africa to £95 million a year by 2007, we will double it again by 2010 because clean water saves lives and helps more girls to go to school.

And we will significantly increase our spending on social security in at least ten countries in Asia and Africa over the next three years, because we know that one of the most effective ways to break the cycle of destitution that affects the poorest and most vulnerable, is to give them a hand up to get them back on their feet.

Now, all of this will need to be done in a world that is changing, with population growth, rapid urbanisation, the depletion of natural resources, and climate change.

This will be the ultimate test of global good governance. We will:

- work to secure international agreement on a long-term stabilisation goal;
- seek to ensure that developing countries are able to fully participate in any international negotiations; and
- support countries in adapting to climate change, while generating the investment needed for clean energy.

Mr Speaker, we will also need an international development system fit for this century, and not the last. We will push for:

- reform of the United Nations so that there is pooled funding centrally and a single plan in each country;
- an integrated UN humanitarian system that responds faster when crisis strikes;
- further reform of European aid so that the EU can play its full part in international development; and
- a better system for holding all of us, developed and developing countries alike, to account for the promises we have made.

Finally, because this is a task for all of us, but particularly for the next generation, we will:

- double our investment in development education so that every child in the UK has a chance to learn about the issues that shape their world;
- set up a new scheme to help UK groups build links with developing countries, and
- expand opportunities for our young people and diaspora communities to volunteer in developing countries and to undertake internships with development charities.

Mr Speaker, there is much for all of us to do.

We have listened to the voices of people in developing countries as they told us all what they hope for.

We have listened to the British people as they campaigned to Make Poverty History.

And with their and the House’s support, and the proposals I am setting out today, the UK will play its part in helping people to eliminate poverty and to change their lives, and thus our world, for the better.