More questions than answers for UK aid heading into 2026

For much of us in the sector, 2025 will be distinctly remembered as the year that the UK government upended its commitment to international development cooperation, slashing the UK official development assistance (ODA) budget from 0.5% of Gross National Income (GNI) to 0.3% by 2027.

While UK aid, especially that sent abroad, has been declining for several years, the short-sighted decision to cut UK ODA further to fund an increase in defence spending has sent a worrying signal about this government’s vision for the UK’s role in the world.

We understand that the world has changed, and the UK is under pressure to step up its defence spending. But we’ve also been clear that cutting UK ODA is the wrong way to promote security and stability. This latest cut ignores the critical role that ODA plays in keeping the UK safe. It represents less than 1p in every £1 of public spending, yet brings a huge return on investment.

It is a strategic investment in global stability, which benefits the British taxpayer just as much as it helps communities abroad. Every pound of UK aid spent wisely is a pound saved on future crises.

These cuts carry real time and profound consequences for those supported by UK aid funded programmes, particularly the most marginalised communities. We are already seeing the significant impact, with programmes from health centres in Somalia to education programmes in Syria being forced to close. No government should balance its books on the backs of those who need it most.

Unanswered questions heading into 2026

At the time of writing, we are still waiting to hear on FCDO allocation decisions for 2026 onwards, which will provide a clearer picture of where remaining cuts will fall. We’ve been clear with the government that the Equality Impact Assessment (EIA), published alongside the 2025/6 FCDO allocations, fell significantly short of the standards and approach required to minimise the harm caused by the ODA cuts.

With the information currently available to us, we cannot understand how the EIA meaningfully informed FCDO allocations for 2025/6 programmes  We’ve urged the government to ensure that the EIA for remaining allocations is produced significantly ahead of the deadline for allocation decisions, so it can be used to meaningfully inform these decisions and avoid it being a tick box exercise after decisions have been made. They also need to ensure that the relevant teams and technical leads within the FCDO are consulted to develop the methodology of the next review and are involved in ensuring these findings inform allocation decisions.

Alongside waiting for clarity on where the sharpest cuts will fall, we’re also closing the year with many unanswered questions regarding the UK’s strategic vision for development. The vision set out by Minister Chapman as far back as May includes four distinct shifts in how the UK will transform its approach to international partnerships moving from; 1) donor to investor, 2) service delivery to systems support, 3)  grants to expertise, 4) international intervention to local provision.

Regardless of the opportunities or concerns that these shifts may bring about, what’s undeniable is that we still have no further detail on what implementing these changes will look like in practice, nor how they fit together under a cohesive vision for UK international development.

Is the government planning to produce a development strategy to lay out, in full detail, how its approach to development cooperation is changing and the case for whether these changes will have meaningful development impact? If not, what other government strategies are guiding ODA decisions? What is going to guide country-level decision-making for ODA spending? Will there be clear development objectives, priorities and targeted outcomes? Who is leading in making decisions about ODA spending and priorities in-country? How does this fit with a long-term strategy for locally led development? These are just some of the unanswered and burning questions we have heading into the new year.

In 2026 we’ll be looking to understand how the government intends to grapple with some of the tensions raised by the Minister’s new vision, including how the government plans to meaningfully shift to locally led development while centring UK expertise. And how the government plans to address the challenges presented by moving away from service delivery and what this looks like sustainably.

Given the limited resources that FCDO and other departments delivering UK aid will have in the future, we will continue to advocate for funding to go where it makes the most difference.

There has been a lot of talk this year about the potential to mobilise the private sector to fill the gaps created by global ODA cuts. While the private sector can play an important role in sustainable development, with the right guardrails and alignment with national development priorities. However, it’s unclear what has evidenced such a wholesale FCDO departmental shift towards that of an investor, given the limited demonstrable development impact of private finance.

In 2026, we’ll need to see a more nuanced, evidence-informed approach to private capital mobilisation, one which recognises that there are limits to where private capital will go, and highlights the need to continue protecting scarce grant-based funding for the countries and communities who need it most.

Our submission to the recent International Development Committee’s Inquiry on the Future of Aid sets out concreate suggestions for the FCDO as they tackle these defining questions around partnership and the opportunity for the UK to adopt a justice and rights-based approach to international cooperation.

Rethinking development cooperation and partnerships

Beyond the questions about where remaining aid cuts will fall and practicalities of delivering UK aid for those who need it most, this is a unique moment to bring about some of the long-called-for changes in development cooperation.

Global civil society and Majority World governments have been calling for some time for a more equitable approach to development cooperation, and an overhaul of the unequal decision-making spaces guarded by rich countries. This is the time to fix the system itself, and to have conversations about what new financing systems and partnerships would look like if rooted in justice and solidarity.

With the UK looking to host its Future of Development Conference in Spring 2026, we hope that the government will seize the opportunity to grapple with some of these difficult conversations around the future of development cooperation. We’re eager to see locally led development at the heart of the Conference, as part of the UK’s responsibility to ensure that resources, programmes and decision-making are put more firmly in hands of development partners in Majority World countries.

With a significantly reduced ODA budget, the UK needs to focus this conference on rethinking broader economic systems to ensure Majority World countries have the fiscal and policy space to fund their own development transformations. Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs) have been clear in calling for economic system reform to effectively address challenges such as unsustainable debt, corporate tax avoidance, illicit financial flows (IFFs) and unfair trade rules as a part of the debate on the future of development cooperation.

These are all areas where the UK holds an outsized role, meaning they can afford to be propositional in tabling bold solutions at no cost to the UK taxpayer. We urge the government to ensure these issues are given prominence in the conference’s agenda, which will also help this conference to feed into the London Summit on IFFs and the UK’s chairing of the G20.