Bond reaction to Baroness Chapman’s comments at the IDC
Following the Minister for International Development, Baroness Chapman’s appearance at Parliament’s Select Committee for International Development this afternoon, where she confirmed that there will be less UK aid to spend on education and gender programming following the UK aid cuts and where Nick Dyer, Second Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) said that in an 0.3% world it will be “difficult to provide core funding to BII”, Bond’s Director of Policy and Advocacy, Gideon Rabinowitz, said:
It is deeply worrying to hear the Minister confirm cuts to education and gender programs. Women, girls, and marginalised groups were disproportionately impacted by the previous round of cuts and the government is choosing to abandon them at a time when the US has gutted all gender programming.
The Minister also said that she is fed up with hearing about the need to reform the international global finance architecture and wants answers about how it can be achieved. We encourage her to listen to lower- and middle-income countries proposals which explain how this can be done.
However, it is welcome that the government appears to recognise that further core funding to BII needs to be paused, given the reduced UK aid budget. This will free up much needed grant-based funding towards vital FCDO development and humanitarian programming in lower income and crisis-hit countries.
ENDS.
Notes for editors
- Read Bond’s full reaction to Baroness Chapman’s trialed comments that the UK will no longer be a “global charity”.
- British International Investment (BII) is the UK’s development finance institution.
- Bond is the UK network for organisations working in international development. Bond unites and supports a diverse network of over 350 civil society organisations from across the UK, and allies to help eradicate global poverty, inequality and injustice.
- For further information or interviews, please contact Jess Salter at [email protected] or call 07392972411.
