International Development (Reporting and Transparency) Bill

I join other hon. Members in congratulating my right hon. Friend the Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Mr. Clarke) on securing this debate, and commend the passion and skill with which he made his case to the House. No Labour Member will be surprised by that, as he has long been a campaigner on these issues. He consistently championed the needs of those in sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and Latin America long before such causes became fashionable. I agree with the hon. Member for Boston and Skegness (Mark Simmonds) that my right hon. Friend has performed a remarkable feat in assembling such a coalition of support inside and outside the House, but nobody who knows him will be remotely surprised by that. This has been an excellent debate. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Angela Browning) for her comments, particularly about the considerable opportunities for scrutiny that already take place in the House in relation to international development and the way in which the Bill will further help such scrutiny. The hon. Members for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) and Leeds, North-West (Greg Mulholland) made similar points later in the debate. My right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, East and Wallsend (Mr. Brown) and the hon. Member for Edinburgh, West (John Barrett) rightly congratulated my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, and the Government more generally, on the commitment to the 0.7 per cent. target. My right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith), in confirming his support for the Bill, referred to the excellence of Oxfam, which is based in his constituency and which also supports the Bill. The hon. Member for Buckingham (John Bercow) and my hon. Friends the Members for City of York (Hugh Bayley) and for North Ayrshire and Arran (Ms Clark) eloquently echoed the moral case for development assistance that my right hon. Friend made in his introduction to the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, North (Ann McKechin) referred to the huge appetite among the British people for more progress in the fight against poverty. The hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) reminded the House that development must be a partnership and that developing countries themselves have a responsibility further to strengthen good governance. My hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Linda Gilroy) paid tribute to the huge contribution that co-operatives make in tacking poverty in the developing world. The hon. Member for Bournemouth, East (Mr. Ellwood) rightly mentioned the importance of humanitarian assistance. We will reflect further on that. The right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and the hon. Members for St. Ives (Andrew George) and for Boston and Skegness raised, in their very different ways, a challenging series of questions for the House to reflect on if the Bill progresses, as the Government hope that it will. Aid well spent can make a huge difference. In Burundi this year, a newly-elected Government scrapped primary school fees, and our £2 million of assistance is helping UNICEF to refurbish 500 schools and train 4,000 teachers, bringing hope to many young people in that country who are being given the chance to learn to read and write and to have better lives as a result. In Pakistan, as we speak, our £58 million of humanitarian assistance is helping to shelter and to feed the people of Kashmir—victims of the terrible earthquake in December. It has been rightly highlighted that while much has been done, much more still needs to be done. That is why the Government have recognised the need to commit more development assistance. We have trebled our aid budget since 1997. By the end of the current spending round, we will have reached 0.47 per cent. We are committed, as hon. Members know, to reaching the UN’s 0.7 per cent. goal by 2013, and earlier if we can launch the excellent idea of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, namely, the international finance facility. We recognise the need to be accountable for that progress from 0.2 per cent. to 0.7 per cent., and more generally how aid is used and how other Government policies impact on poor countries. The Bill helpfully codifies the way that Government report on development and how they account for the resources that are spent, and it will place the need for such a report on a formal legislative basis. Helpfully, the Bill seeks to promote the transparency with which assistance is provided. We take seriously our responsibility for ensuring that the money entrusted to us by Parliament for development is used for the purposes intended, and is managed through systems that ensure high levels of accountability to the UK public. We continue to invest in similar systems of accountability in our partner Governments and partner organisations to ensure that money is well spent and is used for what it was intended. In managing public funds we are, for example, required to comply fully with the range of requirements under Government accounting rules, and our use of those resources is subject to an annual financial audit by the National Audit Office. That audit covers our procedures for managing all types of expenditure, including support given to multinational organisations, to non-governmental organisations, to the private sector and that given directly to partner Governments through budget support or other financial instruments. The Auditor General provides his formal opinion on our financial statements to Parliament, and his opinion has always been positive. In addition, the NAO carries out a rolling programme of studies on how well the Department manages its use of public funds. As the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton said, the Public Accounts Committee can hold public hearings, and does, that are based on the reports to which I have referred. There is also the International Development Committee, which challenges the way in which we use our funds.