International Development Bill [Lords]

House of Commons, 23 January 2002.

New Clause 1 — Restriction on assistance to governments involved in gross violations of human rights

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Britain has a strong and honourable tradition and record on aid and development. I congratulate the Government on introducing the Bill, which the Opposition welcome. We believe in strengthening our international aid framework to make it more effective and more relevant and appropriate to changing world situations. We think that the Bill is right, but we also think that it can be improved. That is why I am speaking to the new clause, which would link the giving of British aid with the promotion of long-term, sustainable human rights improvements and, thereby, the promotion of long-term, sustainable development. I should make it immediately clear that the new clause does not seek to restrict direct humanitarian aid. I propose that food, medical and disaster aid should be exempt from the controls that it would introduce.

I know that the Secretary of State for International Development is currently in Tokyo, but none the less, I should like to say that I have long admired her. She has great energy and commitment, especially in this area, and a very big heart. I hope that she will take on board the ideas that I am floating in the new clause and be guided by them in future policy development. As the general thrust of my arguments is sound—some might say that they are merely simple common sense—I have no doubt that she will listen and respond positively. Even if she cannot do so today, she may do so in developing her policy in future.

The House knows well the superb work of my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr. Leigh) on human rights and the promotion of religious freedom around the world. His sound influence will be felt in the new clause, for which he must take all the credit. He is currently unavoidably detained in Committee; otherwise, he would be here to speak to the new clause. None the less, both he and I wholeheartedly support the promotion of international development world wide and would welcome an increase in the amount of UK Government aid that is given to developing nations. However, decisions on whether such aid should be given, how much is allocated and where it is targeted should take into serious consideration the human rights records of the receiving nations. In many cases, aid can and should be used as leverage to pressure Governments into strengthening civil society and improving their human rights records.

Since the 20th century, human rights have become a universal language enshrined in international law, including the universal declaration of human rights, the Geneva conventions and the international covenants on civil and political rights. There is a strong correlation between a state's respect for human rights and its development. That underpins the thesis that I am advancing.

It is no coincidence that most economically developed nations tend to have generally good human rights records, a strong civil society and a democratic Government. Strengthening civil society and significantly improving a state's human rights record are major contributions to the long-term development of any nation. I therefore urge the Government not to give aid to states that engage in or tolerate gross violations of human rights. As I explained earlier, humanitarian assistance such as providing medicine and food is excepted.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

Like the hon. Gentleman, I want to do whatever is possible to promote human rights. It would be difficult to think of a Government with a poorer human rights record than the Taliban when they governed Afghanistan, yet the United Nations argued for massive aid to that country for humanitarian purposes. Much of it required Government support. On 6 September, the UN argued for $560 million of aid. Would not the new clause put such aid at risk?

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

It would put pressure on the new Government in Afghanistan to improve and strengthen civil society and human rights. It would apply positive pressure to try to achieve a freer, more democratic and sounder world.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. Like him, I hope—and have confidence—that the new Administration in Afghanistan will improve human rights. It is an important, positive sign that the Government includes two women. However, my question related to the Taliban. Would he have opposed giving aid to Afghanistan before 11 September, when the Taliban were in power?

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

The hon. Gentleman asks a hypothetical question. We are no longer in that position. If the new clause had formed part of Government policy many years ago, I presume that it would have been used as positive pressure to extract a better record from Governments who abuse human rights. We can apply pressure by many means, for example, diplomacy or simply talking and asking for change. We can also apply economic pressure to improve human rights. The new clause would create a link between human rights and economic pressure.

Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat, North Norfolk)

I acknowledge the importance of putting pressure on countries to improve human rights. However, the new clause goes further. Once a country is listed as a state where gross violations of human rights occur, it can receive no development assistance. The Taliban would have been on the list because they were probably the worst Government in the world for violating human rights. The new clause would have prevented any aid to Afghanistan. Would the hon. Gentleman have wanted to achieve that?

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

If the hon. Gentleman reads Hansard, he will realise that I excluded purely humanitarian aid from the remit of the new clause. Medicine, food and disaster aid is therefore exempt. The new clause covers budget support and development aid. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman agrees with my constituents who do not want British money to support despotic regimes. We do not collect taxes to do that, and our constituents do not pay taxes for that.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

Let me make a little progress. The hon. Gentleman may catch my eye later.

Perhaps I can define the "gross violation of human rights" that the new clause tries to control. It includes

"violations of the right to freedom of religion"

and the

"persecution of individuals or groups on the basis of their ethnic origin or membership of a particular ethnic group."

The new clause is about conditional, not tied aid. The basic thesis of new clause 1 is linking human rights to aid. It is an idea for the future. The Government's view on the future potential for this linkage would be appreciated, whatever their view on the new clause at this late stage of the Bill's progress.

According to Library research paper 01/85, published on 1 November 2001, clause 1 states that the Secretary of State may provide development aid if she is satisfied that this is likely to contribute to a reduction of poverty. The paper states:

"Development assistance is defined as assistance provided for the purpose of:

Furthering sustainable development in one or more countries outside the UK or;

Improving the welfare of the population of one or more such countries."

For the purpose of clause 1, sustainable development is defined as

"any development that is, in the opinion of the Secretary of State, prudent having regard to the likelihood of its generating lasting benefits for the population of the country or countries in relation to which it is provided."

I argue that, unless aid is linked to promoting good, sustainable human rights—as new clause 1 proposes—it will not satisfy the test of whether it is likely to generate lasting benefits for the population of a country. As hon. Members have already tried to argue, a short-term case can be made for giving aid at any given time, but perhaps they will see that my proposal is a good idea for the longer term, when they look back and see how the world is developing.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

In Belarus, the Government under Lukashenko is one that most of us would want to put on a list, if one were to be manufactured according to the provisions of the hon. Gentleman's new clause. However, I have been part of an initiative involving a partnership between two communities—one in this country and one in Belarus—seeking to resolve a particular problem in relation to AIDS and HIV, which has also extended into other areas of civil society. In the city of Svetlogorsk, this has achieved an extension of the participation in government by a much larger number of people. If such activity is repeated across a country, it can turn that country around and start to move the political climate towards one that might overthrow a President such as Lukashenko and replace the system with a more democratic one. I would not want that sort of effort to be put at risk by blacklisting any development assistance being given to projects such as these.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

The hon. Gentleman is obviously a great expert on Belarus and on that kind of aid. I do not think that my new clause would put such aid at risk, because it would exclude humanitarian and medical aid. My proposal would bring forward the spreading of democracy and good human rights practices in countries such as Belarus.

I shall give an example of my own. The millions of pounds in aid that the British Government give to Vietnam should be conditional on the Vietnamese Government making significant progress with their human rights record. How else are we to get change? That must include Vietnam ending its persecution of Christians and the adherents of other religions, and stopping the continuing atrocities against the Montagnard people of the central highlands.

Giving aid to Governments who engage in or tolerate gross human rights violations—as Britain currently does—only supports such despotic regimes, and is more likely to hinder than to help long-term development. Making aid conditional can promote human rights. It can also give more purpose and long-term impact to our aid programmes and make them more focused, and make development sustainable, which is one of the key qualifying tests that the Government set out for their aid programme. This could be a sound way to secure change in Zimbabwe, to give another example.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

Does the hon. Gentleman's entirely laudable commitment to human rights represent a policy shift within his party? I well remember, when the Conservatives were last in government, that it was their policy to encourage trade with Burma, which has one of the worst human rights records in the world. I can also remember the time when Baroness Thatcher, as she is now, dubbed sanctions against the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa minimal in their effect. I certainly do not recall any pronouncements by the then Conservative Government against the gross infringement of human rights in Chile, either while there was a fascist regime in power or even afterwards. Surely, the issue here is that—

Sylvia Heal (Deputy Speaker, Halesowen and Rowley Regis)

Order. The hon. Lady should make her point briefly.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

All the new clause would do is punish those who have already suffered the denial of their human rights.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her kind words in introducing her question. I know how seriously she takes these matters, and the House always listens when she speaks on these subjects, but I think that on this occasion she is wrong. The new clause would allow humanitarian aid to be made available and it would put pressure on regimes that are doing things wrong to plan and make improvements and to move towards democracy. In the longer run, it would achieve what she most wants—a safer world in which there is more care for people's freedoms.

The hon. Lady made some sound points about the Conservatives' record, but we are now opening our ears to what the people have to say. Our constituents do not want us to give taxpayers' money to despotic regimes that flout human rights; they want us to use that money on development aid, as we should, and they want to see us do so with a sense of purpose in order to develop good practice around the world.

Tony Cunningham (Labour, Workington)

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Glenda Jackson), I think that the hon. Gentleman's aims appear to be laudable and I understand why he wants to link human rights, good governance and aid. However, I share the concerns that my hon. Friend expressed. It is the poorest people in the poorest countries of the world who are suffering under despotic regimes, and they are the people whom we should be helping.

The new clause refers only to humanitarian aid, but two major issues are health and education, and money for those comes from a long-term budget rather than a humanitarian aid budget. The new clause would not allow us to spend money to improve health and education through, for example, non-governmental organisations in the civil society that we are trying to help and protect, instead of giving aid to Governments. The danger of the new clause, however laudable it might seem, is that it will lead to people who are suffering now suffering even more.

Sylvia Heal (Deputy Speaker, Halesowen and Rowley Regis)

Order. I remind all hon. Members that interventions are meant to be brief.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his comments. He made some sound points. It seems from all the interventions so far that there is agreement between hon. Members on both sides of the House that my intentions in tabling new clause 1 are laudable and right in principle, but the detail may require more discussion and development. That is the point of the proceedings, and I am delighted that we are having the debate. We can discuss the definition of humanitarian aid, how much medical assistance and food it should include, whether education comes into it and whether the new clause should simply exclude budget support. Those are points worth debating.

I shall give an example of a purposeful use of aid so that the House will understand my aims. The United States uses legislation and the suspension of overseas aid as a means of promoting human rights abroad. We can learn from its International Religious Freedom Act of 1998, which created a number of tools to promote religious freedom as a foreign policy goal and to combat religious persecution in other countries.

The law identifies a wide range of diplomatic and economic tools that the President may apply to those countries that engage in systematic and on-going violations of human rights and religious liberty. The action that the President may take against such violations of religious freedom includes suspending US Government aid to offending states. That constitutes US Government recognition of the principle that aid should not simply be handed out to overseas Governments without their human rights records being seriously considered.

The US Act is an example of creative and common- sense use of legislation, including the leverage that may be applied through overseas aid to put significant pressure on states with poor human rights records. The mere existence of the Act and the range of sanctions that may be applied against state violators of human rights puts significant, tangible pressure on them to improve their human rights records. In the longer run, it will achieve better, more sustainable development, which is what we should all seek.

We in Britain should adopt a similar approach to promoting religious freedom and other human rights across the world. The new clause would deliver smart sanctions—encouragement for and pressure on countries to open up their borders, which is a step in the right direction that Conservative Members have promoted for many years. Many Governments who grossly violate religious freedoms and other human rights are unlikely to listen to persuasion and mere expressions of concern alone, notwithstanding the extraordinary persuasiveness of the Secretary of State, who is in Tokyo.

We should call on offending Governments to stop allowing human rights abuses, and non-humanitarian assistance to those countries, such as the budgetary support that the UK gives the Pakistani Government, should be used as leverage for them to improve their human rights records as soon as possible. That could have been done with Pakistan.

The new clause would allow the Government to use economic as well as diplomatic levers on Pakistan, for example, to persuade it to move from its system of government—a military dictatorship—towards democracy and a stronger civil society, which I know the hon. Member for Workington (Tony Cunningham) wants to promote.

Tony Cunningham (Labour, Workington)

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way, but I am not sure that the US is a good example to use in an overseas aid debate. Of the 22 most developed countries, it is bottom of the league as it gives only 0.1 per cent. of gross domestic product to development and it has not signed all sorts of UN treaties, including the land mines treaty, which most developed and many underdeveloped countries have signed.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

The hon. Gentleman chooses one statistic, but in straight cash terms the United States comes out top of the pile. We are debating what our taxpayers give to the developing world, what long-term effect that money will have, whether we can change the world and whether, in 25 years, we shall be able to say, "That was a good new clause. We should have taken it on board earlier." I hope that the Government are listening to what I am saying.

Experience shows that Governments are often unwilling to improve their human rights conduct unless failure to do so inflicts a significant cost on them, especially if it can be measured in tangible economic terms. In practice, that principle is rarely applied. For example, the Indonesian Government have received significant British aid in the past year despite the fact that they totally failed to prevent an extremist Islamic group, Laskar Jihad, from sending 8,000 fighters to the Molucca islands to wage a jihad—a so-called holy war—against Christians. Those Islamic terrorists were not from the Moluccas and they included Afghans and Pakistanis, yet the Indonesian Government have made little or no attempt to remove them.

Several weeks before travelling to the Moluccas, Laskar Jihad publicly announced that it would wage a jihad against the Molucca Christians, yet the Indonesian Government did absolutely nothing to prevent that. On 25 October 2001, the Prime Minister, no less, wrote to President Megawati about this extremist group, but the British aid continued. So did the human rights abuses, proving that words alone, even from such a person as the Prime Minister, are just not enough. They are not the answer and we need economic pressure to go with them.

Laskar Jihad is well armed, having received many weapons such as mortars and automatics from the Indonesian military. Moreover, Indonesian Government soldiers have joined its attacks on Christians. On 13 December, the BBC reported that authorities in Indonesia had confirmed that al-Qaeda fighters have been fighting in Sulawesi to support Laskar Jihad's war against the Christians there. The Indonesian Government's indulgence of Laskar Jihad has enabled it, if not encouraged it, to widen its area of operations and instigate horrific and brutal violence against Christians, not just in the Molucca islands, but in central Sulawesi.

There are about 28,000 internally displaced Christians in Tentena in central Sulawesi. Since June, Islamic fighters have cleared Christians from the town of Poso and the surrounding areas. Those Christians were forced to take refuge from the violence in Tentena. They are short of food, medicines and shelter and their situation is truly dire. If Laskar Jihad succeeds in Tentena, another mass slaughter of Christians in the region is likely.

This is not simply an issue of religious liberty. It involves people being displaced, brutalised, tortured and murdered because of their religious beliefs. That is a form of ethnic cleansing and it is most serious. Obviously, the Indonesian Government should remove the Islamic fighters far from the vicinity of Tentena, but they are not doing so.

The fighters' removal would minimise the chances of an anti-Christian massacre, yet no such action is being taken, notwithstanding the Prime Minister's intervention last year. Perhaps he would do more good if he postured and travelled the world a little less and spent more time in the House focusing on home policies such as the new clause, which is relevant to our constituents and British taxpayers.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

The hon. Gentleman is extremely generous with his time and I thank him for giving way. He talks of appalling occurrences in Indonesia. What would be the consequences for aid to Indonesia if his new clause went on the statute book? Would it stop all aid to Indonesia?

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman has given me yet another opportunity to reiterate that, had the new clause been on the statute book, the Indonesian Government might have been minded to prevent Laskar Jihad from moving into the Moluccas and murdering those Christians. Perhaps he is not aware that, so far, 6,000 Christians—not 600 or 60—have been slaughtered in the Moluccas. Even if only six had been slaughtered, that would still be serious.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

rose—

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

rose—

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

I must make progress, as other Members want to speak and I am taking up a lot of time. The new clause would concentrate the Government's mind on those valid issues. Whether they continue to give aid to Indonesia should depend on how much the Indonesian authorities are willing to do to take firm action against Laskar Jihad and restore order in the Moluccas and Sulawesi.

As I said, thousands of Christians have already been slaughtered in the Moluccas and thousands more will perish in Sulawesi unless the Indonesian Government drastically improve their response to the situation. If the Indonesian Government continue their policy of simply trying to accommodate military Islamic groups, it will not be long before Indonesia becomes a safe haven for a variety of terrorist organisations, possibly including the al-Qaeda network.

There are a number of steers by which Britain can help to promote human rights: we can go through the European Union, through the Commonwealth or along with the United States. We can also introduce new clauses such as this, which is designed to make much more effective the British Government's attempts to improve other countries' human rights records and to prevent the scandal of British taxpayers' money being used to support Governments who grossly violate human rights.

Expressions of concern about human rights are important, and I readily thank the Government for what they do and the way in which they do it. However, we also need economic pressure, including the sanction of withholding international development assistance where appropriate, or at least making it conditional.

To accept the new clause is to acknowledge the important principle that improving a country's human rights position greatly enhances its long-term development process, which is the overall aim of the Bill—and a good aim. I ask the Government at least to acknowledge that fact in dealing with the new clause. Common sense tells us that the new clause reflects the view of an overwhelming number of British citizens, who do not want their money used to support regimes that fail to respect human rights and religious freedoms, therefore inhibiting rather than promoting development in the longer run.

By adopting the principle of new clause 1, the Government would not affect humanitarian aid. They could show that they really care about human rights and are prudent and sensible in distributing British taxpayers' money as aid—as they should be.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

I want to speak against the new clause. As I said to the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) in my—as you pointed out, Madam Deputy Speaker—over-long intervention, if his proposal represents a change in terms of his party's commitment to human rights, that is extremely welcome. I elucidated some examples of a total lack of care and concern for human rights when the Conservative party was in government, which I believed and still believe were shameful.

What was equally shameful was the Conservative Government's inability to dispense taxpayers' money for overseas aid at a level which my constituents found acceptable—not to put too fine a point on it. The Conservative Government spoke about attempting to meet UN targets, but did nothing practical to reach them. This country's contribution, during the seemingly endless terms of Conservative government, was constantly reduced.

I take issue with the hon. Gentleman on his scandalous misrepresentation of the Government of Indonesia. It is not Indonesian Government policy to enter into the activities to which he referred. Those are criminal activities. The hon. Gentleman significantly failed to point out that Indonesia is one of the most populous and one of the poorest countries in the world. For that Government to be able actively to engage in attempting to eradicate what I understand is mainly guerrilla activity is extremely difficult. Tribute should be paid to the present Prime Minister of Indonesia. Despite huge pressure, she has managed to retain her country's commitment to, and participation in, the international community's opposition to the events of 11 September and still actively support the international community's attempts to eradicate international terrorism and its roots.

Andrew Robathan (Conservative, Blaby)

I apologise to the hon. Lady and to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for not being here for earlier speeches, but I had another engagement.

May I take the hon. Lady back to what she said about the Conservative Government's contribution to overseas aid? She is factually incorrect—it is as straightforward as that. The overseas development aid given during the Parliament from 1992 to 1997 was greater, as a percentage of GDP, than that given from 1997 to 1999. It has now risen—I do not criticise the Labour Government, because their aid programme has generally been good—but Library figures show that aid went down in the first three years of the Labour Government.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

If the hon. Gentleman cares to check in tomorrow's edition of Hansard, he will find that I referred to Conservative Governments and their endless period in power. The period to which I referred was from 1979 to 1997, during which, if memory serves me rightly, this country slipped from being third in the international league of overseas aid donors to eighth or ninth in a list of 10.

Tony Cunningham (Labour, Workington)

I want to explain what the figures are, so that we can all understand. I have them before me. When Labour came into Government in 1974, ODA as a percentage of GDP was 0.36 per cent.; when we left in 1979 it had risen to 0.51 per cent. When the Conservatives left office in 1997 it had gone down to 0.26 per cent., the lowest point that it had been at in 30 years.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving those figures, which are irrefutable.

Let me return to the central thrust of the new clause. The hon. Member for Castle Point seemed to argue in a time warp in terms not only of the Labour Government's approach to international aid and its disbursement but of the extraordinary work done by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Development and, it must be said, by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. There has been a transformation in the world's approach to how aid should be disbursed, to whom it should be given and the purposes for which it should be given.

I do not wish to make a party political point out of this, because Labour Governments were guilty of it as undoubtedly were Conservative Governments, but in the past, aid was often linked to the economic needs of the donor country. We all know stories about tractors given to African countries being found, two years later, rusting at the side of the road because nobody had thought to fund those nations to pay for the spare parts that they needed. Nobody had considered that such countries could not afford the fuel for such vehicles. Virtually every hon. Member in the Chamber would have a story about that type of unproductive aid.

However, the world has moved on. The hon. Member for Castle Point constantly repeated that his taxpayers did not wish to see their money going to Governments whose human rights record was lamentable. Nobody wants to see that, and that is not where the money that this country gives the developing world goes. All donor nations have acknowledged that the root cause that must be tackled, if the developing world is truly to develop in a sustainable way, is poverty. Poverty expresses itself in ways that are simple to see. It means that far too many children die of preventable diseases; far too many people have absolutely no access to clean water; millions of people lack the most rudimentary basic health treatments; and massive numbers of people can only hope to be able at some point to give their children an education.

That is where the hon. Gentleman is way out of time—as I said, he is in a time warp. We all acknowledge that the best delivery of aid is via non-governmental organisations directly to people on the ground. That ensures that, in giving aid to third world countries, we help to take those millions of people out of poverty in a way that is direct, recognisable, easy to monitor and moderate.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

The hon. Lady said that my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) was in a time warp. In my hon. Friend's defence, he was talking about how future legislation should be shaped. Much of her argument was predicated on the calculation of aid as a percentage of gross domestic product. Is not the percentage of GDP spent on aid a misleading measure if the size of the economy is not taken into account at the same time? When the economy is strong, the percentage of GDP may fall in absolute terms but there may be a cash increase in aid. To talk in percentage terms can be misleading, but that is what her argument is predicated on. I am sure she will accept that my hon. Friend was referring to legislation about the future.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

If the hon. Lady's description of what her hon. Friend's new clause is about is aid in the future, it is rather bizarre, because that would be a gross waste of taxpayers' money. Perhaps she has not learned the lessons of the past, when aid from Government to Government significantly failed to transform the lives of the people who needed it most. Heaven forfend that a Conservative Government should ever come back into power. Is the hon. Lady suggesting that if that were to happen, aid would go from Government to Government? That would be absurd.

I am perfectly prepared to accept what the hon. Lady said about the percentages changing from year to year, but I am not prepared to accept that the diminution in aid during the Conservative Governments' regime was anything other than shameful for this country. Her argument seems to be predicated on the assumption that there will always be a need for the developed world to fund desperately poor countries. Surely we have learned that aid should enable the people of poor countries to equip themselves so that they can develop their own countries in a sustainable way. That is why the Department for International Development is giving primacy to the eradication of poverty, and to ensuring that children are educated, that there is basic health care, and that children have clean water to drink. I pay tribute to the Department for that.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

It is good to have an exchange of views on this point. If the hon. Lady applies the word "shameful" to a diminution in the percentage of GDP spent on aid during the last Conservative Administration, would she apply the same description to the decline in the percentage of GDP on aid during the early period of the Labour Administration?

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

No, I most certainly would not. [Interruption.] Hon. Members had better wait. The Labour Government made it abundantly clear when they first came to office that they were attempting to deal with this country's problems, which the Conservative Government had created—[Interruption.] It is all very well for the hon. Member for Castle Point to laugh. If I remember rightly, he was laughing on the other side of his face when he lost his seat because the Conservative Government had failed to convince the people that they could govern. People had clear evidence of the economic incompetence that had placed this country in the economic position that the Labour Government found when we first came to power in 1997.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

The hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) raised an interesting point when she said that the percentage will vary slightly if the economy is performing well. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Glenda Jackson) will agree with me that we should look at the trend. Under the Labour Government, the percentage has risen. The percentage in the United States, which the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) referred to, has consistently been appallingly low considering the wealth of that country.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

My hon. Friend reiterates a valuable point that has already been made. However, there is something more important in the points that the hon. Member for Meriden elucidated in her interventions. There is a perception—I do not accuse the hon. Lady of this—that the developed world's responsibility towards the developing or undeveloped world is based exclusively on the percentage of gross domestic product a country feels it is capable of handing out around the world or tossing into the various receptacles that are held out. That is not my perception of the responsibility shown by the developed world.

The developed world should do a great deal more. DFID has led the way in many areas, and I give credit to those who believe that the money given is never going to be enough and that there must be a sharing of knowledge, ideas and techniques. I suppose that a brilliant accountant could tell us what that would represent in pounds, shillings and pence or dollars, but the idea that the Government have been at the forefront of developing has to do with valuing human beings. That is infinitely more powerful than a Government's commitment—although I like that commitment—to meeting United Nations targets.

Nick Hawkins (Conservative, Surrey Heath)

Does the hon. Lady recognise that the issue of percentages was raised by her hon. Friends in their interventions on my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink)? It is easy to see how the Government could increase their percentage. All they have to do is to continue to wreck the economy, and as our GDP declines, the percentage will go up and more and more people will realise how wise the voters of Castle Point were when, after four years of a disastrous Labour Government, they brought back my hon. Friend.

Sylvia Heal (Deputy Speaker, Halesowen and Rowley Regis)

As interesting as these points about percentages are, we should get back to the main point of new clause 1.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

I have to say to the hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) that if that was his attempt to cover up or half-heartedly apologise for the Conservative Government's shame, he should have stayed sitting on the green Benches. It was as lamentable an intervention as the Conservative Government's policies during their terms of office on the aid that this country should have been giving to assist the development of the third world.

I come to the nub of my opposition to the hon. Gentleman's new clause. As my hon. Friends have said, if the percentage of GDP is the overriding decider of the disbursement of aid—whatever the definition of aid, and I have defined it as more than merely financial—that punishes the very people whom we should be most actively engaged in supporting. There has been a shift in the disbursement of aid. If that is the overriding policy, it negates the possibility of assisting the people who are suffering gross infringements of basic human rights to stand on their own feet and get rid of their Governments, not necessarily by violent means.

One of the reasons why there is so much conflict in the world and why there are endless factions in Africa and the terrible stand-off in Colombia at the moment is that people have not been encouraged to free themselves of the view that they are perennially and eternally victims, because the basic tools have never been put into their hands. The basic tools are health, education and sufficient food to move out of the daily prison of ensuring that they have a life the day after.

I remember going to Ethiopia in 1985. The worst of the second great famine was over, but to me it was absolutely fascinating how much time, energy and creativity people spent gaining enough in one day to ensure that they could live the second day. That was true for every member of a family. As soon as children were able to stand unaided, they had a job to do. When they became a little more capable, they would be given more demanding jobs. Babies might have to do no more than collect grass to feed animals; bigger children might have to herd animals, and once they could handle sharp implements they might cut the grass. The whole family worked all day simply to ensure that, perhaps, they could live throughout the next day. There was not even a perception of being able to live until the end of the week.

That constitutes a gross waste of human energy and human creativity, in a country in which, despite the appalling nature of what the people had suffered, social structures remained firm. There were no riots. People were not murdering each other, or stealing. It was an amazing privilege to visit that country. If the new clause is passed, however, the hon. Member for Castle Point will condemn generations to the same circumstances, in which survival is all.

Tony Cunningham (Labour, Workington)

I said in Committee that perhaps the single most important issue was that of the education of girls, which would take millions of people in developing countries out of poverty. The new clause would prevent that from happening in some countries, because it does not constitute humanitarian aid.

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

That is a central point. We must move away from the idea that I think the world generally has at present, and accept that aid given directly to Governments is often non-productive. Aid to repressive Governments is absolutely non-productive.

The hon. Member for Castle Point would condemn the very people whom he purports to want to help to being stuck for ever in a situation that it would be virtually impossible for them to escape—unless those who are willing to exploit the desperation of others intervened. We have touched briefly on the issue of international terrorism. I do not think anyone here would dispute the fact that it can take a hold in certain parts of the world precisely because of the desperate circumstances in which so many people find themselves.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

Either the hon. Lady is intellectually challenged, or she is purposely mischaracterising what I seek to do. I do not seek to condemn anyone; I seek to give people hope for the future. I want the possibility of real, sustainable, long-term development, rather than the counsel of despair that we have heard from Labour Members who propose short-termism in the extreme. How would they change the world for the better? How would they eradicate poverty, and ensure that those little girls received an education? What action do they propose, other than that suggested in the new clause?

Glenda Jackson (Labour, Hampstead and Highgate)

With the best will in the world, I must tell the hon. Gentleman that he will have to live a long time before he intellectually challenges me. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."] Oh yes: if you ask for it, you get it.

The hon. Gentleman has clearly lost the thread of his own argument, quite apart from not understanding ours. The new clause would deny aid to those who need it most desperately. I also consider the idea that some of the most entrenched and abusive Governments necessarily change their attitude to their people because of the threat of possible withdrawal of international aid to be a fallacy. In many instances, they exploit that very factor to make their position of power even stronger.

We all know of the most obvious example in the world today. Even as we speak, an attempt is being made to pursue that argument in Zimbabwe. It would be entirely wrong to punish people yet again for the sins of Governments whom, in nine cases out of 10, they have had no say in putting into power. That would drive international aid back from a position that I consider to be quite good at present, and would send entirely the wrong messages to those whom we want to move forward into a democratic life. It would be a recruiting sergeant for all who are only too willing to exploit human misery to secure and develop their own power bases.

I hope that the hon. Member for Castle Point will reconsider and withdraw the motion, but if there is a vote I hope that the House will reject the new clause.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

At first I had a great deal of sympathy with what I thought the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) was trying to say, and I was prepared to listen to him. By the end of his speech, however, I was quite horrified. The amount of almost anti-Islamic rant made me extremely depressed.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

Pro-Christian.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

I am a Christian, and I hate the thought of preventing aid from going to a country where some sort of religious persecution is going on, whatever religion is involved. It is appalling to think that that could be deemed a reason for withholding aid.

We need only look at Northern Ireland to see what Christian can do to Christian, or at Asia to see what Sikhs can do to Hindus, Hindus can do to Muslims and Christians can do to Muslims. It is endless. It is entirely irrational to suggest that the persecution of one religious group by another is somehow the responsibility of a Government who have adopted a certain human rights policy. I am sorry if I have offended the hon. Gentleman, but as I have said, I am a Christian, and I am thoroughly fed up with the unchristian attitude of an awful lot of Members who claim to be Christians as well.

I thought that the idea of a list of countries was rather fun. It is wonderful, is it not? Think of the countries that could be listed as violating human rights. Subsection (2)(a) of the new clause refers to countries that have

"engaged in gross violations of the right to freedom of religion".

Does that include the shaving of the heads and beards of deeply religious Muslim prisoners who have been taken to the United States? The hon. Gentleman may not think so, but if he was one of those deeply devout Muslims—we may mock them and think them a little mad, but never mind—he might consider such action a violation of his religious freedom.

Nick Hawkins (Conservative, Surrey Heath)

Perhaps I have missed something. Was the hon. Lady talking about the deeply devout Muslims in Guantanamo Bay just now? If so—and that is how it seemed—she should bear in mind the fact that we are talking about some of the most dangerous terrorists in the world, who are happy to murder Christians, atheists, agnostics and anyone else with no compunction.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

We are indeed talking about some of the most dangerous terrorists in the world. I am merely saying that we must not violate their right to practise their religion: they must have that freedom. I do not question their guilt or otherwise. I simply say that what was done constituted a violation of their religious freedom.

The list would be endless if we catalogued all the countries suggested in the new clause, and the proposal by the hon. Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Glenda Jackson) that the Indonesian Government should be held responsible for all that goes on in the massive number of islands that call themselves the country of Indonesia is incredible. Moreover, as we have signally failed to stop religious groups persecuting each other in Northern Ireland, I think it would be very difficult to criticise other countries.

Andrew Robathan (Conservative, Blaby)

The hon. Lady and I agree on many of these issues, but may I make a factual point about the Muslims in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba? I understand that an executive order from President Bush states that they will have freedom to pray and freedom of religion. I also understand—I am not an expert on the Koran, or indeed on Islam, but I have visited many Islamic countries—that growing hair and beards is not required by the Koran. Those who have been on a haj tend to grow long beards, but I do not think that it is compulsory.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. What the individual feels about his religion is the important thing. Many Sikhs are happy to shave off their beards and not wear turbans but other Sikhs want to maintain that tradition and would consider it a violation if they were not able to. We have seen examples of that in this country with policemen's helmets and motor cycle safety helmets. It is a violation of their freedom to tell them what they must do. We must respect individual human rights as well as talking generally about human rights.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

Will the hon. Lady give way?

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

May I make some progress, because the debate on this single new clause is going on a bit?

I accept that the hon. Member for Castle Point proposed the new clause with the best of intentions, but we must always remember that in those countries where human rights are being abused live the people who most need aid of every kind, whether humanitarian or development aid. There is an important distinction. At times, he did not appreciate the difference between humanitarian and development aid.

I am passionate about education; many hon. Members are. I want humanitarian aid to southern Sudan—we give only humanitarian aid to Sudan—to include education. The civil war in that country, where human rights are violated daily, has meant that its people receive only humanitarian aid. Two or three generations have not received any education.

That is surely wrong. If the new clause provides only for humanitarian aid and excludes education, it will deny those people a chance to learn what their human rights should be. It is only by educating people that they will ever learn about human rights and ever know what to do about the Government who are violating them. On that count alone, the new clause should be thrown out.

The point about Afghanistan has been well made. Some hon. Members may remember that before 11 September many people, including me, were seriously worried about the famine that had developed in central Asia—in Afghanistan and all the surrounding countries—because of three years of drought. In Afghanistan, it was made worse by a terrible Government called the Taliban. I called for Afghanistan to be bombed with food and aid.

The "bomb" word was unfortunate, when I think of what followed, but if Afghanistan over the past 10 years had been flooded with food, aid and development, al-Qaeda might not have found a base there, 11 September might not have happened and we might not be having to pour reconstruction aid back into that country.

Andrew Robathan (Conservative, Blaby)

Again, I have a lot of sympathy with what the hon. Lady says about Afghanistan. However, I do not quite understand how development aid in education can be put in place in a country without the support of the civil authorities. Is she suggesting entirely private schools that would be outwith any form of social and political structure in the country?

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

That could have been channelled through the non-governmental organisations. In fact, I have spoken to a representative of one NGO that ran 150 schools for girls in Afghanistan in the run-up to 11 September. So it was happening. If we had done much more of that, perhaps the catastrophe would not have happened.

Whichever way we look at it, there is no argument to say that we must deny people aid if human rights are being abused. It is too difficult to measure what we mean by that. I think that Opposition Members have the best of intentions, but the new clause is misguided.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

I listened carefully to the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink), but I was not personally convinced and I do not think that he has carried the House with him. I am as passionate as anyone in the House about the need to defend and extend human rights. It is a perfectly right and proper objective of our aid programmes to seek to assist that process.

I draw to the House's attention several factors that illustrate why the new clause, however well intentioned, would harm the victims of human rights abuse, rather than help them. Recently, the Select Committee on International Development visited some Afghan refugee camps in north-west Pakistan. While there, we saw people living in unacceptable conditions.

One of the refugee camps we visited, Kachagarhi camp, had been there for 20 years. People were either not working and living on food aid, or working in the black economy. Only about a third of the children attended primary school. If one were trying to create a seed bed of resentment, those are the conditions one would want.

The situation was bad enough when the Russians were in Afghanistan, but after they were forced out, western interest in the Afghan refugees declined and conditions in the camps got worse. They became a seed bed for anger against the west, in which Al-Qaeda and other terrorist organisations were able to recruit; we created conditions that helped that to occur. By providing long-term development assistance, therefore, we create conditions that make it less, not more, likely that terrorism will develop and that human rights will be abused.

The states and regimes that consistently and horrifyingly abuse human rights tend not to be run by humanitarian democrats—by the sort of people who will look at the United Kingdom statute book and say, "We had better change our behaviour before we find that development assistance to this country has been slimmed down." I found it instructive that on the two occasions the hon. Member for Castle Point was asked whether he felt that human rights abuses should have led to a reduction or ending of aid to Afghanistan when the Taliban were in power, and to a reduction or ending of aid to Indonesia now, he wisely declined to give an answer. He would have been very unwise to say that we should have let the victims of the Taliban starve to death because of drought in central Asia, and that we should not give poor people in Indonesia opportunities to build a future.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

Two points—first, my new clause excludes food aid, so people would not have starved. Secondly, it would have put pressure on the Taliban to look at human rights and to change what they were doing in a sustainable way. People would have lived in a better situation.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

Again, I do not think that Mullah Omar is the sort of academic, humanitarian, liberal-minded person who could be brought round to good common sense by our passing a bit of legislation. Do not forget that the most powerful nation on earth, the United States of America, spent three years asking the Taliban regime to give up the al-Qaeda terrorists who had bombed in Tanzania and Kenya so that they could stand trial. The Taliban were not the sort of liberal humanitarians who felt that that would make sense, so if we want to affect the behaviour of brutal dictators and human rights abusers, we must do tough things that hurt them. We must stop the aid to them. But had we stopped the aid that Afghanistan received even when the Taliban were in power, we would have hit not the Taliban but the victims of their human rights abuses. I do not think that that is what the hon. Member for Castle Point intends.

Andrew Robathan (Conservative, Blaby)

The hon. Gentleman will know that we did stop aid. UN sanctions prevented development aid from going in. I am a trustee of a mine clearance organisation for which 400 local Afghans worked. However, it could get no funds from the UK, because the Government abided by the sanctions against development aid. I am sure that the Minister will correct me if I have got that wrong.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

We did not stop all development assistance to Afghanistan, even in those difficult times. However, the hon. Member for Blaby (Mr. Robathan) makes the important point that an aid regime that stops and starts is ineffective. It can yield the sort of results that he and I saw in the refugee camps in Pakistan. People get angry when the helping hand that they think is coming from the west is taken away.

Moreover, aid to Pakistan was halted after the military coup. For good human rights reasons, there was a pause. Hindsight is a great tutor, but I do not think that that pause was helpful, as it created the resentment against the west that has been so damaging.

The hon. Member for Castle Point made a distinction between humanitarian aid and development assistance. If it were possible to make that distinction easily and clearly, in practice and on the ground, there might be some sense in adopting a modified form of his proposals. However, it is impossible to make that distinction on the ground.

I shall share with the House two brief examples of that impossibility. They arose when I visited Sudan, a country that all hon. Members would say was a state that abuses human rights. I went there on behalf of a number of British NGOs to look at the human rights situation. Britain's Conservative Government of the time had a policy—rightly, in my view—not to give state-to-state aid because of the regime's human rights record. They did however provide some aid for NGOs to work with their local counterparts.

At the end of my visit, I spoke to Baroness Chalker. I felt that the then Government's approach was right at the time, but that it should not be tied down in statute, as flexibility was needed to ensure swift response to changing events. However, what I saw in one of the camps for displaced persons around Khartoum threw into sharp relief the distinction between humanitarian aid and development assistance. Such camps contain hundreds of thousands of displaced people, internal refugees from the drought in the west of the country and from the civil war in the south.

The aid agencies that we funded were able to take water to the squatter camps in the desert. Temperatures were at 120 or 130 deg F, and the agencies were able to take water in buckets on the backs of donkeys to the camps, because that was classed as humanitarian assistance. However, although the camps had existed for years, the agencies could not pipe in the water, as that would have constituted development aid.

Does it make sense to stipulate in law that water can be taken in buckets on the backs of donkeys to hundreds of thousands of people living in the most rudimentary conditions in the Sahara desert, but that a water pipe cannot be built? It does not, because the people in those camps are the victims of the Sudanese regime. We should help them. If we do not, we shall be creating another seed bed for the sort of terrorism and extremism that this House rightly opposes.

My second example is a little different, although it also comes from Sudan. A food-for-work project was being run by CARE International in north Kordofan province. Severe drought meant that many small pastoralists would have starved to death without the food and humanitarian aid that the organisation provided. The hon. Member for Castle Point says that that aid would get through to such people, whether or not the new clause was accepted.

In return for the food aid, however, the people were building water reservoirs—haffirs—that would enable their animals to drink throughout the drought, and would mean that people would not be long-term dependent on food aid. Would it have been sensible to say that we could give them food aid, but that we could not help them construct a safeguard against drought in an area stricken by drought? It would not.

Finally, the haffirs were built mainly by the sweat of local people's brows as they worked with picks and shovels. For part of the work, however, digging equipment was needed to make the reservoirs effective and workable. Bulldozers needed to be hired, and in north Kordofan province only the provincial Government had them. To create food security for the people of north Kordofan, CARE International had to hire bulldozers from the Government of a state that abused human rights. That was done not out of a desire to aid that state, but out of a desire to aid its victims.

I hope that the House will agree that both examples show how important it is to provide the food security and development infrastructure that people need. However, the new clause would render that impossible. I understand why the new clause has been proposed, and I accept that it is important to tie human rights advances in with development work, but I do not think that it would achieve that in practice.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

Like most hon. Members, I agree with the spirit of the new clause, which would restrict assistance to Governments guilty of gross violations of human rights. We do not want to support people who commit such violations, but like my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Glenda Jackson), I remember with revulsion the support that this country extended to Governments such as those in Burma and Chile, who had committed—and continued to commit—gross violations of human rights.

I have therefore considered the proposal with some care to determine whether I can support it, and I have listened to the debate. The central problem that needs to be resolved in connection with this new clause—and with new clause 3, which we may discuss later—is how we get countries whose Governments commit such violations to reform. Do we disengage completely from them, blacklist and cold-shoulder them so that they are left outside the international community, or do we engage with them?

Sometimes we might want to do both things, but the new clause requires that only the cold-shouldering option can be taken. It would remove the option of engagement, which I believe should be taken up much more often.

When I intervened in the speech by the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink), I mentioned a scheme in Belarus. It was funded by the EU, through TACIS—technical aid to the Commonwealth of Independent States. The scheme had two local government partners—Mendip district council in Britain, and the authority in the city of Svetlogorsk. New clause 1 (4) states:

"No assistance shall be provided under Part I of this Act to the government of any country."

Local government is part of Government, so the scheme that I am about to describe to the House would not have been allowed to progress, had the new clause been passed.

The chief executive of Mendip district council, on a visit to Svetlogorsk, saw an extraordinary situation in which a city was experiencing an exponential rise in HIV/AIDS infection as a result of an epidemic of drugs in a new town created by Khrushchev in the 1950s. He populated the town with various ne'er-do-wells from throughout the Soviet Union so that they could work in a chemical factory. The indigenous population were skilled at growing their own narcotics. That was a fairly explosive combination, as one might expect, but it was kept under control by the Soviet state.

When that state collapsed, there was an explosion in drug abuse, which led to an exponential growth in HIV/AIDS infection. When the chief executive of Mendip district council visited the city, following visits from children of Chernobyl—the city is in the Chernobyl fallout area—he saw what was going on and saw that the local government there refused to acknowledge that there was any problem.

The initiative and partnership that followed, funded by the European Union through TACIS, was an exchange of expertise. Mendip organised local government officers, drugs charities and health authority officers to travel to Svetlogorsk. They gave of their own time; TACIS paid only their air fares. They shared expertise in dealing with HIV/AIDS infection. As a direct result of that initiative, the exponential growth in HIV/AIDS infection in the city of Svetlogorsk levelled off. That partnership was then expanded into waste management and all sorts of matters that certainly would not be regarded as humanitarian assistance, but which represent a development of civil society.

Part of the success of that partnership was due to the fact that the local government in Svetlogorsk was willing to acknowledge that there was a problem and was willing to publicise the problem. It was willing to train its own officers, and to tell local police officers, "When you are searching a drug addict, do not put your hands in their pockets unprotected; otherwise you too may be infected." Such basic educational messages spread through the city and turned the situation around. I use that example to illustrate how helpful local government partnerships can be.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

The hon. Gentleman speaks passionately on a subject about which he knows a lot, but he is missing the point of my new clause: it excluded medical aid.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

I hear what the hon. Gentleman is saying, but I ask him to listen to what I am saying in turn. I am saying that what might appear to be simply medical aid developed, in this case, into many other areas, such as waste management; but more fundamentally, it changed the attitude of the mayor and the local administration. It has empowered the citizens of that city and made them engage with their government in a way that central Government would have nothing to do with. The nature of that central Government is pretty abhorrent to me, but the partnership works locally and, incidentally, it gave a great boost to the officers of Mendip district council.

Tony Cunningham (Labour, Workington)

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the problems with the new clause is the fact that it talks about

"medicine, medical equipment or supplies"?

If we were limited to providing humanitarian aid, we could provide the drugs, but we could not build the clinics or hospitals and we could not obtain the nurses and doctors for the long-term programmes that would benefit the country. The new clause would allow us to deal with patients once they were ill, but would not allow us to prevent them from becoming ill or to provide them with decent clinics and hospitals.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

I do not want to take up more of the House's time. I just wanted to use that example to impress on the hon. Member for Castle Point the fact that we do need the flexibility for Governments to engage, be it at central or local government level. I ask him to withdraw the new clause so that we may move on.

There are times when the new clause probably would not work, anyway. Consider Cuba. Blacklisting by the United States has been tried and does not seem to have shifted Fidel Castro to date, unless I have missed the news. It could even be argued that we are not getting far with sanctions against Iraq. I ask the hon. Gentleman to consider withdrawing the new clause and allow us to move on.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

At the start of the debate, I grew a little bit concerned that, having had very little party political point scoring on Second Reading or in Committee, we were about to descend into it now. We are returning to the final stages of the Bill after an exceptional break. We all understand the reasons why the final stages of the Bill had to be deferred from just before Christmas to make way for the emergency legislation. The passage of time has probably allowed us more time to reflect on the conflict in Afghanistan and its aftermath and the way in which the legislation would work in the case of such a country. In a way, the passage of time has allowed us to bring some fresh thinking to the discussion.

I had the slight feeling, on hearing the exchanges that have just taken place, that it is quite difficult for the Labour party to hear fresh thinking from the Conservatives. We had quite a lot of exchanges devoted to what had happened in the past, when the Conservative party was in government. It may be proving quite difficult for the Government to hear from us the fresh thinking that we wish to inject into the debate. One of the few advantages of being in opposition is the chance to think again—the chance to do blue-skies thinking and to bring fresh arguments. I hope that, in his reply, the Minister will give us credit for the fact that we are coming fresh to the debate. Many Conservative Members, including myself, were not in this place when the Conservative party was in government, so we feel particularly free to suggest new ideas.

When I hear hon. Members say that it is simply too difficult to do something—I heard the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge) say that it was too difficult effectively to tackle Governments who are shown to have tolerated or perpetrated human rights abuses—I feel that it is a challenge, and that we should be able to find a way of cracking that conundrum. I know, because I was told very early on as I tried to get to grips with my brief, that the received wisdom is that we should not make development assistance conditional on the receiving Government's having an acceptable human rights record.

Later in the debate I shall cite some case studies. The present situation is not very satisfactory in the eyes of ordinary members of the public, to whom we as a party have been listening. When I talk to ordinary members of the public about increasing development assistance, they often voice to me the major reservation that the money will only get into the hands of the wrong people. They therefore do not feel a strong desire to increase the level of assistance.

We share with the Government the United Nations target of increasing our assistance to 0.7 per cent. of GDP, but we must take the public with us. That is what it is all about. In taking the public with us, we need to try to satisfy the public disquiet over development assistance money getting into the wrong hands and being used for the wrong purposes. That is a basic motivation that underlies the new clause.

The purpose of the new clause is to raise the concern that Governments should address human rights in their relations with other states where there is evidence of human rights abuses. There is always a danger of glossing over issues of human rights where other political expedients are seen as paramount.

Tony Cunningham (Labour, Workington)

I have a fairly simple question. The amendment talks about gross violations of human rights. Many people—although not everyone—would say that carrying out the death penalty, certainly for the individual, is a gross violation of human rights. Are you saying, by supporting your new clause, that any country that has the death penalty would therefore automatically be excluded from development aid and receive humanitarian aid only?

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I am sure that Madam Deputy Speaker would immediately spring to her own defence to say that the new clause is not hers; it is that of my hon. Friends the Members for Castle Point (Bob Spink) and for Gainsborough (Mr. Leigh), and I am speaking in support of the thrust of their new clause. Obviously, it would be for the Government of the day to decide what constituted a gross violation of human rights, but if the hon. Gentleman will be patient with me, I shall talk about a country that does use the death penalty in a way that I personally think constitutes a violation of human rights.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

The hon. Lady has just told the House that it would be for the Government of the day to decide on a discretionary basis whether a country is a gross violator of human rights and, if that were the case, to decide whether to make aid available, but the Government already have that freedom. Legislation is not needed to give the Government the freedom to take a decision not to provide aid in the circumstances that she describes.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I hope that the hon. Gentleman would accept that the new clause would provide legislative underpinning to support Government action, whereas it is now less obvious to the public that we as a country are making such distinctions about what we condone and what we find offensive. What I mean will become clearer when I give some practical examples.

The rather opaque jargon for that practice is "critical engagement"—not a phrase of which the man on the street or even I would immediately understand the interpretation. I believe that the correct interpretation is that that phrase allows the Government to raise human rights issues while continuing to maintain political and commercial relations.

I should like to place on record the fact that we share Amnesty International's concern that that policy of critical engagement may be a fig leaf for business as usual. New clause 1 would require clear evidence of an improvement in a country's human rights record before it could be removed from a list of countries that the Secretary of State considered to be engaged in or to be tolerating human rights abuses. Being placed on the list would cut off the offending country's Government from assistance, with the exception—I cannot emphasise this point enough because it has been missing from some of our exchanges—of humanitarian assistance. It would certainly also not preclude providing assistance through non-governmental bodies. In the eyes of the public, it is very easy to understand that distinction, and there is no question of precluding such development assistance.

The hon. Member for City of York (Hugh Bayley) gave the hypothetical example of not allowing water to be piped in and having to bring it in by donkey, but, for example, in a country such as the Congo which needs humanitarian assistance—water and sanitation work needs to take place—obviously, the most intelligent solution is to provide water in the most efficient way possible, which, I should imagine, is not bringing it in by donkey.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way again. It was not a hypothetical question; it was a practical, real-life example of a decision that a British NGO working in the Sudan had to make because of the Conservative Government's decision that they would support, through NGOs, humanitarian assistance such as providing water to people who were very thirsty in a displaced people's camp in the desert, but that they would not support development assistance such as building the infrastructure, a water pipe, needed to carry that water. That decision was forced on the NGO by the Government's policy—a policy that was sensible at the time. It is right that the Government should have the discretion to decide when to refuse to provide aid, but they should not be required by law always to take that decision.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

Let us get back to the future. I am sure that the House will not want to spend an entire evening debating historical policy, and that the hon. Gentleman will accept that the purpose of proposing amendments to legislation that is not on the statute book is to address how we conduct ourselves in the future. I simply want to stress the point that the new clause specifically states that humanitarian assistance should not be precluded. I have sometimes felt that that point has been misunderstood in our exchanges.

Resistance to taking a stance against countries that have a poor human rights record has always centred on trying to avoid making the lives of innocent people more difficult, and I hope that the Opposition have made it perfectly clear that that is absolutely not our intention. Under the new clause, there would be no prohibition on the provision of medicine, medical equipment, food supplies and other humanitarian assistance. I hope that I have made it perfectly clear that the term "humanitarian assistance" would extend to the kind of infrastructure that is necessary to ensure that humanitarian assistance is effective and gets through.

Whether Amnesty International's concerns are justified can be assessed only by looking at case studies of countries that fall into that category. One of our most notable human rights dialogues—if that is a fair description of what it is—is with China, but respect for human rights is deteriorating even as the dialogue continues. According to the Foreign Office, China aspires to end the death penalty, yet capital punishment—to which the hon. Member for Workington (Tony Cunningham) referred earlier—remains widespread and its use has expanded. Almost 3,000 people were sentenced to death between April and June last year. Almost 2,000 of those sentences were carried out during that period, and the crimes included bribery, fraud and theft. That is very difficult to comprehend, certainly for me as a British citizen.

The selection of China to host the Olympic games is seen by optimists as an opportunity to persuade that nation to show greater respect for human rights, but pessimists have the countervailing view that the honour of being chosen to host such a prestigious international sporting event shows an abusive country that it may continue as it pleases and still receive its reward. That sends a very mixed signal.

Another topical example is the Government's stance towards development assistance to Zimbabwe. There are plenty of examples of human rights abuses, but one of the most flagrant was President Mugabe's announcement in November that the Government would not allow aid agencies to distribute emergency food supplies to Zimbabweans affected by famine. The Information Minister, Jonathan Moyo, claimed that aid agencies would use the opportunity to smuggle in election monitors and campaign for the opposition party—the Movement for Democratic Change.

On numerous occasions, we have urged the Government to demonstrate to the Government of Zimbabwe that we do not accept a business-as-usual approach to those flagrant human rights abuses. Most recently, today, came the second of the debates in Westminster Hall that the Conservative party has requested on Zimbabwe. As the Hansard report of today's debates is not yet available, it is worth emphasising for the benefit of hon. Members some of the points that were made in that debate. Zimbabwe is a very good test case of what I am talking about. Because of the day-to-day images on television, the public are generally very well informed about the human rights abuses in that country, but we continue to provide development assistance.

At the Labour party conference, the Prime Minister said that there would be

"no tolerance of . . . the activities of Mr. Mugabe's henchmen in Zimbabwe."

Those are strong words, but what does the phrase "no tolerance" mean in relation to the human rights abuses in Zimbabwe? So far, it has meant that the Government have taken no appreciable action. I am all the more concerned, given that the MDC is calling for help. A member of the MDC said:

"We are fighting on all fronts using the only tools we have—the truth, the written and spoken word, and the courage of our leadership".

The MDC said:

"In this deteriorating situation where the abuse of civil and human rights has become commonplace, where fear rules and freedoms exist in word only, we urge the"

Governments of Europe

"to remember the pledge made in Nuremberg—'Never again'."

It also said:

"we urge the European Union to take appropriate measures".

We, too, urge the Government to take appropriate measures, and the new clause would provide a legislative underpinning for them.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

The hon. Lady must realise that Zimbabwe is a difficult example to use to illustrate her point. The problem with the Zimbabwean Government is that they see us as the wicked colonial country. Therefore, any action that we take will reinforce their view. That is why the Movement for Democratic Change is calling for Governments—not just Britain—to take action. The action should come from the Commonwealth and from the European Union, but not unilaterally from Britain.

Tony Baldry (Conservative, Banbury)

rose—

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I will reply to the intervention before I give way again.

The hon. Lady says that Zimbabwe is a difficult example. The chances are that countries that are shown to abuse human rights will be difficult examples. They will hardly be easy, but that does not mean that we should flinch from the issue. To hide behind a sense of embarrassment about our colonial past would be seen by many ordinary people as an excuse for inaction. Worrying about our colonial past certainly did not stop the Prime Minister making pronouncements about Kashmir. I have difficulty understanding the hon. Lady's argument.

Who is to provide thought and leadership in the Commonwealth if not Britain? Of course, we want other Governments to take action but, as the conflict in Afghanistan demonstrates, this country is not afraid of being brave and taking the lead.

Tony Baldry (Conservative, Banbury)

I thought that I could help my hon. Friend by pointing out that, unlike the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge), I took part in this morning's debate on Zimbabwe. Would it surprise my hon. Friend to learn that the Liberal Democrat Foreign Affairs spokesman, the right hon. and learned Member for North-East Fife (Mr. Campbell), made a robust speech calling on the Government immediately to introduce sanctions against Zimbabwe? Is that not yet another example of the Liberal Democrats saying one thing in one place and another thing in another?

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. In this respect at least, the Liberal Democrats have proved themselves consistent in their inconsistency.

Julian Lewis (Conservative, New Forest East)

As my hon. Friend knows, I initiated the debate in Westminster Hall. I posed the question as to whether liberal left-wing angst and the fear of being accused of neo-colonialism was a problem. It quickly became apparent that it was a substantial part of the problem, but I do not understand why such fears did not hold us back from intervening in Sierra Leone. I went to Sierra Leone and the people were only too delighted by our presence there. If there had been a poll on becoming a colony again, they would probably have voted for that. When people are in such desperate straits as the people of Zimbabwe are, the last thing that will be on their mind is the thought, "Oh, we must support the Government again, because Mr. Mugabe is able to say that Britain is being colonialist again." The fears expressed are preposterous left-wing nonsense and the sooner we see an end to them, the better.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I should have congratulated my hon. Friend on securing the debate in Westminster Hall. He is the second Conservative Member to have been successful in securing a debate on Zimbabwe. Labour Back Benchers were marked by their absence in contributing to the debate, and that is regrettable. However, I promised that I would not be drawn into the temptation of considering the party political aspects of this issue, so it would be a good idea to return to the main thrust of the new clause.

I do not want to detract from the importance of Zimbabwe as an example and I hope that the Minister will return to the issue when he responds. How the Government conduct themselves in relation to a country such as Zimbabwe is very much in the public eye. Like it or not, our pasts are intertwined and I am sure that there is not a Member of the House who has not received an e-mail, letter or other communication from a constituent with relatives in Zimbabwe. The subject therefore involves our national interest.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

Will the hon. Lady give way?

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I was about to move on from the case of Zimbabwe and to turn to another one, but I will give way.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

A little bit of self-defence is necessary before the hon. Lady leaves the subject of Zimbabwe. I was not in Westminster Hall for the debate on Zimbabwe because I was doing something else at the time. However, I am sure that my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North-East Fife (Mr. Campbell) spoke about taking a robust lead in the Commonwealth and the European Union so that we have multilateral action on Zimbabwe. That is the point that I wanted to make.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

Once again, this shows the value of debates in Westminster Hall. However, I wish to give the hon. Lady a piece of advice. My right hon. Friend the shadow Foreign Secretary and I were present in the debate, and the issue of Zimbabwe crosses the boundary between foreign affairs and international development. Given the subject's topicality and importance, there is a case for the spokespersons on both subjects attending such debates.

I am glad that we have tested the value of the new clause against a topical example. That is more valuable than testing it against what happened in the past, and perhaps even more valuable than discussing hypothetical impacts in the future. The situation in Zimbabwe is real and we all know that disaster looms. That is why we emphasise the need for the Government to act while there is still time.

The other example that I wish to consider is the situation in Burma. More than 340,000 Karen people have been displaced as a result of Burmese military activity, and other ethnic minorities, such as the Shan and Kavenni peoples, have suffered terrible atrocities at the hands of the military, including extra-judicial executions, forced labour, rape, torture and the destruction of their villages. I know that the Minister is aware of that. Many people are forced to live in the jungle and, if they are seen, they can be shot on sight.

Burma is one of the few countries against which a policy of isolation has been practised, but how do we get humanitarian relief to those who need it? The answer shows the practical thrust of the new clause, because the developed community faces yet another challenge in making sure that the aid reaches those who need it. That is especially true for those who live in countries where there is no dispute about the facts that gross violations of human rights have taken place and that the Governments of such countries have attempted to obstruct our efforts to get humanitarian assistance to those who need it. Again, the thrust of the new clause would be to provide the legislative underpinning that would help to ensure that assistance gets to where it is needed.

There is no suggestion that humanitarian assistance would be blocked by the new clause's incorporation in the Bill. The new clause's main purpose is to focus the attention of the Government and, as it transpires, that of the Liberal Democrats on a conundrum that should not be regarded as difficult. It should be possible for us to find a way of working that addresses the public's disquiet that taxpayers' money does not always go to those for whom it is intended and deals with the discomfort that the public feel when assistance is given to countries that flagrantly abuse human rights.

The new clause offers a refinement to the received wisdom that we cannot do anything about the problem for the fear of hurting those who are already down. Conservative Members contend that it is possible to refine policy in a way that will ensure that those who really need help will receive it while sending the clear message to those who abuse human rights that we do not accept such behaviour.

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

I welcome the opportunity that the debate on the new clause has provided. I am grateful for the way in which the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) raised his concerns and endorse his comments about the interest that the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Mr. Leigh) takes in the subject and, particularly, in the problems faced by religious minorities. That issue was discussed in Committee.

As several hon. Members said, if we reflect for a moment on our history as a country, it is clear that we do not have a particularly honourable record on religious discrimination. The hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge) rightly drew our attention to the fact that, in parts of the United Kingdom, people are tragically still being killed because of their religion. We need to think about that.

Fresh thinking is genuinely welcome. Although the debate has been wide ranging, a small party political element crept in. However, as the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) said, it has not featured much in our proceedings. If the fresh thinking of the Conservative party includes coming to the conclusion that the aid budget will not be cut under a future Conservative Government, I would welcome that. It would be a sign that together we have moved on and made progress. Please can we have fresh thinking of that nature.

If we are truly to eliminate poverty, as the hon. Member for Castle Point said, we need societies that promote a sense of value in their citizens. They need to be committed to equality, non-discrimination and the promotion of human rights. All of us can agree with those aims. However, the debate has clearly demonstrated that the difficult question is how we take those aims forward in relation to particular countries at particular times and in particular circumstances. A key question is to what extent we are prepared to engage with Governments who are abusing human rights or who have a questionable human rights record, in order to persuade them to mend their ways. The answer, as we know, is that we are prepared to do so, bearing in mind that a range of responses is possible, depending on the circumstances.

Vietnam was mentioned. We are making, and continue to make, representations to the Government of Vietnam, who have made considerable progress in reducing poverty in recent years. We have raised the treatment of religious minorities with them, both in the EC-Vietnam joint commission meeting and, most recently, in September when my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary raised it with his opposite number from the Government of Vietnam.

We discussed Indonesia at length. My hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Glenda Jackson) made the case on that most forcefully. I had the opportunity to visit Indonesia in September last year. The country has a fragile and emerging democracy, having come out of a long period of dictatorship. My hon. Friend was right to say that we must be careful. The circumstances are difficult. There is a conflict in Sulawesi, to which the hon. Member for Castle Point referred. There is much conflict and movement in Aceh as people fight for independence. President Megawati recently agreed to a high degree of self-government for Aceh in an attempt to respond to the legitimate concerns about self-government while not giving way to those who are fighting.

When it comes to countries that have people who are linked with al-Qaeda or who have fought for that cause, we have to reflect on the fact that we are learning more and more about the countries in which those individuals find themselves. Indonesia is not the only country where supporters of al-Qaeda have been present.

On the death penalty, I have great sympathy with using that as an example of a gross abuse of human rights. Indeed, I cannot think of a clearer abuse. However, should international development aid be the only instrument that we use to pursue a case against the use of the death penalty by other countries? Should it be the only instrument of influence? I yield to no Member of the House in my detestation of the death penalty, but we have to ask whether the new clause sets out the right approach. We need to reflect carefully on the wording of the new clause, and I hope that we do not accept it.

The hon. Member for Meriden mentioned Burma. She knows that the UK provides targeted humanitarian assistance for the most needy in that country, working strictly through the United Nations or international NGOs, and not with the military regime. That is a good illustration of the extent to which the Government use their judgment to decide on the nature of engagement depending on the regime or Government with whom we are dealing. Each case has to be dealt with on its merits. It is not a matter of having a policy that is black or white, yes or no, for or against; the issue has many shades of grey.

The new clause gives rise to practical difficulties because it adopts a black-and-white approach. First, drawing up a list of countries that engage in or tolerate gross violations of human rights would raise controversial, difficult and practical issues in defining what "gross" means in that context. For instance, some countries may have reasonable human rights records in general, but commit serious violations of specific rights. Any attempt to draw a line between the gross violaters and countries with less than perfect records could lead to inconsistency, controversy and judicial review of the Secretary of State in exercising that discretion.

The second practical difficulty of a black-and-white, either-or approach is that, on the one hand, countries that are not on the list might think, "Oh well, we're okay. We've somehow got a seal of approval. We don't have to worry about our performance." On the other hand, those countries that are on the list might become less willing to listen to public and international opinion. It is often in those countries where violations are most persistent that we are keenest to engage. Again, my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate made a powerful case for engagement.

The House will be aware that when we can work with Government officials, we seek to do so. If that is not possible or effective, we work with NGOs and other organisations to promote mutual understanding and tolerance. A genuine dialogue on human rights is the best way to achieve lasting change. The restrictions in the new clause would limit the range of approaches that we could take, and we would run the risk of diminishing our capacity to work in the interests of the people who are suffering from human rights violations. A number of my hon. Friends made that point forcefully.

The object of the elimination of poverty must extend to people who might be discriminated against for their thoughts, their conscience or their religion. We have to be able to work with the Governments of countries where human rights are being abused if we are to improve the rights of the poorest people. Bangladesh is a good illustration of that. None of us would think of putting that on the list, but its landless have been fighting for years to win their rights for land. The law provides for that, but they are not able to access it because the existing landowners have hired heavies to make their lives difficult. In some cases, according to the landless labourers that I met, the local police had beaten them up when they tried to exercise their rights. We have a big programme in Bangladesh. Part of that relates to police sector and security reform. On the basis of my visit there last week, I believe that it is right and proper, despite those difficulties, that we should be fully engaged in supporting the Government of Bangladesh who are keen to make progress in overcoming those problems.

My final point relates to subsection (4) of the new clause. The hon. Member for Castle Point came close to acknowledging that the wording of the new clause leaves something to be desired. That was reflected in the fact that, with the best will in the world, he had some difficulty in answering the pertinent questions put to him by a number of my hon. Friends about how we would interpret the provision in relation to specific examples. To take Zimbabwe, to which the hon. Member for Meriden referred, the fact that the proposed exemption for humanitarian assistance refers specifically to

"medicine, medical equipment or supplies"

is significant, because one programme that we are supporting there is trying to deal with the scourge of HIV/AIDS devastating that country, as well as other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, in part by working with Government agencies or bodies. Clearly, medicine and medical equipment would not be affected by the new clause, but what about awareness programmes? On any interpretation of the wording of the new clause, one could not describe an awareness-raising programme to get people to think about the dangers of HIV/AIDS as constituting

"medicine, medical equipment or supplies".

The way in which we respond to the terrible problems in Zimbabwe will rightly be a matter of continuing debate inside and outside the House, but the kind of activities that we are currently supporting in that country, such as developing a standard training curriculum for family carers in local languages for HIV/AIDS, and producing mass information self-help materials on managing health, for example, to prevent a cough from turning into TB or to make sure that safe sex is practised, would, I am afraid, be ruled out by the wording of the new clause. For that reason, while I freely acknowledge the importance of our debate and the fact that the hon. Member for Castle Point and the Opposition have rightly raised matters which must continue to occupy our minds and need consideration, I am afraid that the new clause is deficient and would create all the difficulties to which my hon. Friends have drawn attention. For that reason, I urge the hon. Gentleman not to press it to a vote.

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

I listened to the Minister carefully and am grateful for his kind words, particularly about the principles behind the new clause, and the thoughtfulness with which the House has considered the proposal. I am disappointed that the Government are not yet ready to give the people of this country a more sensible and purposeful means to distribute aid, which would support sustainable improvements to human rights while protecting humanitarian aid.

My proposal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found good in principle but difficult, and so has not been tried. I tabled the new clause in a genuine effort to improve the Bill, which I generally support. The hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell) has regularly suggested to the Government that they give more aid to Iraq, but the Government rightly continue to refuse to do so for the reasons set out in the new clause. Are not the Government, when they choose, already adopting that provision as policy?

Hugh Robertson (Conservative, Faversham and Mid Kent)

My hon. Friend touched on an important point. I have been struck by the fact that, in many cases in the past 10 years, we have started to deliver humanitarian aid on the back of conflict, as we have seen in Bosnia and most recently in Afghanistan; that has certainly been the case in a number of places in the middle east. Does my hon. Friend not feel that in such situations it is helpful to have the kind of guidance proposed in new clause 1?

Bob Spink (Conservative, Castle Point)

My hon. Friend is right; the new clause would provide yet another mechanism for the Government to promote both human rights improvements and democratic governance around the world.

I believe that the arguments that I have made tonight are sound, and I trust that they will shape Government policy in future. With that in mind, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 3 — Conditions applicable to aid disbursed via third parties

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

On Second Reading, the common ground between Members of all parties was apparent and arose largely because the Bill puts poverty reduction at the heart of the Department's spending. New clause 3 was tabled in that spirit and seeks to ensure that any British aid disbursed via a third party is focused on poverty reduction. In its current form, the Bill allows the Secretary of State to provide funding for bodies that do not have poverty reduction as their primary aim.

Clause 1 says:

"The Secretary of State may provide any person or body with development assistance if he is satisfied that the provision of the assistance is likely to contribute to a reduction in poverty."

That is the purpose of the Bill—to limit, or rather to clarify, which individuals or bodies are entitled to funding from the Department for International Development. In Committee, the Minister told us that the Bill's clarity and simplicity were one of its virtues. However, the clarity of clause 1 is lost in clause 4, which states that the Secretary of State may provide funding to

"any organisation which exists (wholly or partly) for one or more relevant purposes"

or may

"contribute to any fund that is intended to be used (wholly or partly) for one or more relevant purposes".

Our new clause would try to restore clarity to the question of which bodies can receive funding, and which cannot. It would ensure that no future Secretary of State could provide funds to bodies that do not contribute to a reduction in poverty. It does not necessarily constitute a criticism of bodies that we currently fund, but provides a safeguard, so that future spending is provided only to bodies that share our development objectives.

In almost every case, bilateral aid programmes provide better value for money than those of multilateral agencies, especially the European Union. The new clause would seek to ensure that our aid budget was not wasted on projects that did not uphold the same standards as bilaterally funded projects. There is no good reason why we should expect or accept lower standards from multilaterally funded projects. I should point out that the Conservatives recognise the value of multilateral aid, and do not think that Britain should act alone on international development. No single country can end world poverty; only by a concerted effort from all donor countries and multilateral institutions will we be able to tackle global poverty. It would therefore be wrong of the Secretary of State to provide UK funds to bodies that do not share that objective.

The new clause is important because we spend a high proportion of our development budget on multilateral aid. In 1999-2000, DFID spent £1.3 billion on multilateral aid; in the last five years, it has spent nearly half its annual budget on multilateral aid. The largest chunk of multilateral aid is provided via the European Union. Indeed, between a quarter and a third of the entire development budget is given to the European Union to disperse. Many Members have serious reservations about whether that is the most useful way in which to spend our overseas aid. It is true that a reform programme—British Commissioner Chris Patten is largely in charge of it—is under way, but its fruits have yet to appear in their full glory.

We currently provide nearly one third of all that development assistance, nearly £800 million worth of British taxpayers' money, through the European Union. When the International Development Committee conducted an inquiry into the future of the European Community development budget, it was deeply critical. It identified

"an unacceptable neglect of the needs of the poorest countries in the world".

On the management of development assistance, it said that

"the excessive underspends in so many of the external programmes reveal a Community unable to manage and disburse its resources, but unwilling for political reasons to take the necessary budget action."

The Select Committee revisited the question of European effectiveness more recently. The report that I have mentioned was published in 1999, but the Committee subsequently considered the effectiveness of the European Union's development assistance in a progress report undertaken last year. It found that while there had been significant improvements in the policy framework, they had yet to penetrate the legal, political and policy instruments governing European programmes in developing countries.

For the first time, poverty reduction has been identified as a central objective of development programmes. Improved communication between the directorates of the European Commission, the simplification of procedures and longer planning horizons are all part of the reform process that is being put in place by Commissioner Patten. One of the most radical new ideas is deconcentration—a word that, like all European jargon, needs unpacking. It is used to describe the process of delegating authority and staff to Commission offices overseas. However, it has given rise to concern among NGOs that they in turn will have to increase their numbers of staff in the field, which will present an additional administrative cost that they are reluctant to bear.

We welcome all those initiatives for reform, but we recognise the Select Committee's assertion in its progress report that it may be several years before we see significant improvement. We advocate that, during that time, we should not entrust the European Union with a greater share of our multilateral development assistance. Let the Commission demonstrate that it can do a better job with the money that we already give it. In that regard, we were surprised to learn this week of the Secretary of State's decision to allow £120 million of reconstruction aid for Afghanistan to be channelled through the EU. For someone who described the EU as the

"worst agency in the world",

that looks like a Damascene conversion.

In answer to a written question tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins), the Secretary of State said only on Monday that she remained concerned that even NGOs were being kept waiting for payment for work they had completed for the European Union. She said that delays

"cause real hardship to the organisations and individuals concerned."—[Official Report, 21 January 2002; Vol. 378, c. 604W.]

It seems even more strange that she is willing to give the EU more money to play with.

Tony Cunningham (Labour, Workington)

For clarification, are we talking about the European development fund, the European Parliament's development committee budget, which is about 2.8 billion euro, or the European Community Humanitarian Office's humanitarian aid budget?

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I am talking about the decision taken by the Secretary of State at this week's Tokyo conference in respect of reconstruction money. Rather than being given bilaterally and directly by Britain to Afghanistan over the next five years, a significant proportion is to be channelled through the European Union's collective effort for reconstruction. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will understand that it is difficult to comprehend why the Secretary of State has taken that decision, given the reservations that she expressed as recently as Monday, when she said in the written answer to which I have referred that she remained concerned about the way in which the European Union treats NGOs that undertake work on its behalf, but which they must initially fund themselves. Some of them are kept waiting for their money for as long as 18 months. I am sure that British donors would be anxious to know that the money that they raise or donate directly for humanitarian purposes may yet have to be used by some of these aid agencies to pay bank loans while they are waiting to be paid by the European Union for the work that they have completed. That is an untenable situation.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

I think that the hon. Lady is mistaken on that point. What happened in Tokyo is that Britain pledged money from its DFID resources: £200 million for the reconstruction of Afghanistan. The European Union has pledged additional money for that purpose from its budget, to which we contribute. It is not that our Secretary of State has decided to channel some of her money through the EU—it is an EU decision. The reason why the EU has pledged so much is that we are there saying that this is an important priority and money is then pledged by other EU member states. Surely she would support the policy.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

The Minister may well be able to clarify the situation. As the Secretary of State has not yet returned from Tokyo, it is difficult for us to be absolutely clear about what she has and has not pledged to do. On Monday, press reports stated explicitly that £120 million of the total sum that the British Government have decided to allocate to the reconstruction of Afghanistan will be channelled through the European Union. That is what is causing disquiet among Opposition Members. We are not satisfied that the European Union makes the best fist of disbursing the money that it already receives from our Government and we are extremely uncomfortable about the prospect of more being given for the same purpose.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

I share the hon. Lady's concern about the need for the European Union to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of its distribution of development assistance, but I do not believe that we should renationalise such assistance and allow all other member states to do so. In other words, I do not believe that we should take development assistance away from the EU. Is she suggesting that EU member states should stop channelling money through the EU or not?

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

For the benefit of the hon. Gentleman, who for some reason may not have been listening to what I said about five minutes ago, I shall re-read the relevant section of my speech. I said that I should point out that the Conservatives recognise the value of multilateral aid, and that we do not think that Britain should act alone on international development. I do not think that I could be more explicit. There is no question of repatriating multilateral aid. We would like only to be satisfied that the taxpayers' money that is given in that way is used efficiently and effectively. The Select Committee report decided pretty definitely that it is not used in such a way and that substantial improvements could be made.

In good faith, we believe that Commissioner Patten is doing his best to achieve reform. However, the Select Committee progress report indicated that progress was extremely slow. My meeting with Commissioner Patten a few days before Christmas confirmed that there was no small frustration on his part about the slow progress of reform, for which there are two principal reasons. The Cresson affair and past fraud sullied the reputation of the European Commission. That led to the introduction of procedures that require no less than 22 different signatures on each individual project. I saw the files sitting on Commissioner Patten's desk. As he pointed out, with the best will in the world, getting 22 different people to sign an individual project causes a certain amount of delay. Surely, it is not beyond the wit of man to design a reform that is strong in cracking down on any possibility of fraud and financially rigorous, but does not cause disproportionate delay. The Opposition would certainly like to see such reform. We remain concerned that progress is so slow and believe that we should not be increasing the aid that we provide in such a way.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

I, too, am confused about what the hon. Lady is saying. Is she suggesting that we should suspend all our contributions via the European Union until it is more efficient at disbursing the money? If not, what is her argument? If she does not believe that, surely she is saying that we should carry on making our contributions through the European Union, despite the fact that she is worried. I do not understand what she is saying.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I hope that you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, understand what I am saying. For the sake of clarity—this is the third time that I have spelled out this point—let me say that we accept the giving of British aid multilaterally and the purpose of doing so. However, we think that it is responsible for both the Opposition and the Government to satisfy themselves that that aid is given efficiently and effectively. Plenty of evidence from the Select Committee report shows that that has not been done as efficiently and effectively as the Committee would like, and I add my name to that sentiment.

Earlier, I specifically stated that we accepted the need for continued multilateral aid. However, we do not support an increase in such provision through the European Union until significant progress has been made on the reforms. The Secretary of State has not yet been able to return to the House to make a statement on the precise decisions that she has made at the Tokyo conference. However, we are disquieted by press reports, which are perhaps misleading. They led those of us who have to depend on them as a source of information to believe that it has been decided to channel £120 million of British taxpayers' money for the reconstruction of Afghanistan through the EU. Perhaps the Minister can confirm whether that is the case. I am sure that I am not alone in experiencing disquiet about that.

The Bill aims to ensure that aid is spent to reduce poverty and not primarily for political reasons. Yet a proportion of UK development money to Europe is spent on pre-accession aid to enable countries in central and eastern Europe to join the EU. We support enlargement, but the requirement always to consider whether aid disbursed by the EU focuses on poverty reduction is fair.

The new clause is not intended to stop the UK providing funds to the EU aid budget. I hope that that is explicitly clear for the benefit of those who failed to understand that the first time that I said it. The Secretary of State may believe that, for all its flaws, the European aid budget has the required poverty focus. Some of the bodies that we fund heavily do not share our view of the way in which development money should be spent.

The new clause is in the spirit of the Bill. It would extend the high standards that we expect from our bilateral expenditure to multilateral expenditure. It is a reasonable amendment that contradicts nothing in the Bill. I hope that everyone who believes that our budget should be used to reduce poverty in the developing world will support it.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

The hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) is trying to achieve an aim that I wholeheartedly support. I am sure that hon. Members from all parties agree that the administration of European Union overseas development assistance should be improved. The International Development Committee has stated that in three reports. Members of the Committee returned yesterday evening from meeting Poul Nielson, the Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, and other officials to ascertain progress on the reforms. The Committee will shortly meet Chris Patten. I therefore support the hon. Lady's aim to improve the quality of EU aid.

Like the hon. Lady, I want the poverty focus of the EU to be as sharp as that of the Department for International Development in this country. The Bill rightly gives that objective statutory backing. However, the new clause will frustrate rather than facilitate that objective.

In 1997 I introduced a private Member's Bill on overseas development and co-operation. It got nowhere, but it sought to amend the Overseas Development and Co-operation Act 1980 to make the alleviation of poverty the prime focus of British aid. That measure went the way of most private Members' Bills, and I am delighted that we have a Government who introduce legislation in Government time to achieve the end that I sought in 1995.

When I promoted my Bill, I tried to achieve the aim that the hon. Lady is trying to achieve in new clause 3. I wanted to make the alleviation of poverty the primary objective of our bilateral aid and to ensure as far as possible that it also applied to agencies through which Britain channelled multilateral aid. It is the right goal for which to strive.

When I tried to draft the Bill, I experienced the same difficulty as the hon. Lady. Her new clause provides that no UK aid for developing countries should be disbursed through a third party such as institutions of the EU

"unless . . . it is likely to contribute to the achievement of the objectives set out in section 1".

It is inevitable that part of the work of multilateral agencies, including European institutions, the World Bank and others will not have a poverty focus, so the new clause would prevent Britain from being a partner in such multilateral agencies. That would be a disaster because the Department's good, progressive policies have pushed a poverty focus to prominence in many of them. For example, the World Bank has adopted a poverty focus.

In May last year, the European Union agreed to make poverty a primary aim of its development work, not least because of the Select Committee's work in the previous Parliament and pressure from the Department. If the new clause was accepted, we would be unable to contribute through the multilateral agencies. We therefore would have no voice or influence in the EU and we would not be able to ensure the positive changes that the hon. Lady seeks.

I am pleased that the hon. Lady has raised the issue with which new clause 3 deals. When I drafted my Bill, the best that I could do to make that point was to insert in the 1980 Act a provision that stated:

"Where the Secretary of State is contributing to programmes to offer assistance to countries and territories outside the European Union in conjunction with other member states, he shall use his best endeavours to persuade the Council of Ministers to observe the principles set out in section 1(2) of this Act."

Clause 1 in my Bill established the poverty focus. The Secretary of State has been using her best endeavours in the Council of Ministers. She has argued for a greater poverty focus for the European Union and that has led to the good policy change that the hon. Lady mentioned in her speech.

If our contributions through multilateral agencies, including the EU, were proscribed, we would not only fall foul of our treaty obligations, but it would be impossible for the Secretary of State to argue for good, progressive changes to which she has been so successful in getting our bilateral aid and some multilateral agencies to subscribe.

I say "well done" to the hon. Lady for raising such an important issue, which we must continue to debate in the House and to pursue with the multilateral agencies through which we channel aid. However, I do not support the new clause. Although it is a vehicle for a good debate, it would be a disaster if it was accepted. I hope that she will withdraw it.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

I have some sympathy for the new clause. At the beginning of her remarks, the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) asked whether bilaterally funded aid was better than multilaterally funded aid. That is an important question, which we must consider. From my limited experience as international development spokesman for the Liberal Democrats, I have concluded that we need more multilateral aid and bigger, more co-ordinated projects. It is quite remarkable to see—for example, as the Select Committee did when it visited Rwanda a couple of years after the genocide—the dozens, if not hundreds, of different agencies all working in the same country, often duplicating some tasks and not covering others. There is often an air of chaos, with a Government unable to get to grips with what is going on in their own country.

My answer to the hon. Lady's proposal is, therefore, no, I do not want to see a lot more little bilateral projects going on. The world has to join together through the multilateral agencies to provide aid on a much bigger scale, with much more ambitious projects that do not duplicate one another.

As we heard from the hon. Member for City of York (Hugh Bayley), the multilateral agencies are taking on the poverty focus. It is remarkable what has happened in the short time that I have been spokesman on these issues for my party. Certainly, the World Bank, under Wolfensohn, has taken on the poverty focus in a big way. A wonderful example of that is the fact that the World Bank was the first to pull out of the Ilisu dam project—about which many hon. Members were concerned—and say, "No, this is not sustainable. This is not a good project, and it must not go ahead." The World Bank led the way, followed—as it happened—by Balfour Beatty, but we shall never know what our own Government would have done about that, because it is no longer relevant.

The multilateral agencies are showing signs of adopting the poverty focus. The European Union is another case in point. I castigate the Government over the Ilisu dam because they were very slow and behaved appallingly over it, but they have certainly moved the European Union's poverty focus. I well remember sitting on a committee looking at Court of Auditors reports into how the European Union spent its money—I have told this story many times—and being horrified that a project dealing with HIV-AIDS prevention in South Africa had had its money earmarked five years earlier, yet that money was still sitting in a bank five years later; nothing had happened. It was absolutely appalling, and I asked at the time how many people had contracted HIV and AIDS and died during the delay in that project.

I do not, therefore, view the European Union development budget through rose-tinted spectacles. It has had huge deficiencies, but it has also made great progress. In fact, Chris Patten is one of my constituents, and I am very proud of him, even if he was—is—a member of the Conservative party, and of the work that he has been doing with other people in Europe. Things are moving there, and there are signs that the process will become much more efficient. We will not make the European Union more efficient by threatening to withdraw our funds, or by getting difficult when it is facing huge problems such as the reconstruction of Afghanistan.

I have massive reservations about the European Union, but we must press ahead. By being there, and by being more engaged in what Europe is doing, we shall see huge improvements over the next few years. I have to castigate the Conservative party over this. If it had not been so indifferent and uninterested in the European Union from the very beginning, perhaps the aid budget would have been better spent; perhaps there would not have been all the bureaucracy that has held up the disbursement of aid. If the Conservatives had only been there at the beginning, framing provisions in the way that they think they should have been framed, things might have been very different. It is no good their criticising the European Union, when they failed to engage at the important time when it was being formed.

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

Will the hon. Lady give way?

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

No, time is short and we need to get on.

There are good points to this proposal. It has made us think, and put on record that hon. Members are seriously concerned about how the multilateral agencies operate. We must, however, go on supporting them, because the way forward is through every country in the world, not just the multilateral agencies, joining together to do something about poverty in the rest of the world.

Tony Baldry (Conservative, Banbury)

I always enjoy listening to the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge) because she reminds me of why I could never be a Liberal Democrat. I shall tease her just a little by asking her who she thinks it was who led the United Kingdom into the European Union. It was the Conservative party. We were there at the beginning; I was there, and many of my hon. Friends were there. We were all involved in the Britain in Europe campaign during the referendum, so let us have fewer lectures about Conservative involvement in Europe. But I am just teasing the hon. Lady.

I entirely agree with every word that the hon. Member for City of York (Hugh Bayley) said, and I do not wish to repeat any of his arguments. He and I, and the hon. Member for Clydebank and somewhere that not even Labour Ministers can pronounce—

Tony Worthington (Labour, Clydebank and Milngavie)

Milngavie.

Tony Baldry (Conservative, Banbury)

We are all members of the Select Committee on International Development, and we have spent the last two days in Brussels questioning and listening to Commissioner Nielson. The Select Committee has published three reports in the past criticising European development aid. I would not wish to pre-empt our report, but we got the sense of the institutions of Europe, the Commissioners and everyone involved in development aid wanting to get to grips with this matter, and of their getting to grips with it. I am sure that there are points to be made at the margins, but the thrust of what is happening in the European Community is reform and the desire to get to grips with it.

I have one or two brief points that I want to make, in addition to what the hon. Member for City of York said. Hon. Members have to find ways of questioning and scrutinising Ministers more closely about what happens at Council of Ministers meetings. This is not just a development aid problem; it goes right across the institutions of Parliament. I have no doubt, from everything that we have heard, that the Secretary of State for International Development is one of the more robust Ministers in the EU Councils responsible for international development in terms of trying to ensure that as many of the EU programmes as possible are poverty focused.

Our ability to get information on those issues is, however, fairly limited and tends to be obtained from occasional written parliamentary questions, either before or after a Council of Ministers meeting. How can we ensure that we get fuller information from EU Commissioners? Members of the Select Committee are fortunate in that we go and question Commissioners from time to time. Indeed, Commissioner Patten is going to be in the House on Monday week, answering questions from the International Development Committee.

I am conscious, however, that our colleagues in the European Parliament have much greater access to what is going on—they are, of course, by definition, there in the European Parliament. In Brussels, I felt that various areas of policy had become something of a secret garden. That was not intentional; no one actually wished to keep us away from the information in question, but simply as a consequence of the rhythm of how policy develops in Europe, we do not always get the full effect of what is happening.

It would probably be helpful if those of us in the House who take an interest in international development met United Kingdom members of the European Parliament's Committee on Development and Co-operation. We were fortunate enough to meet a number of them on Monday evening, and what they had to say was extremely interesting, on a whole range of issues. They had insights into policy development that were sometimes different from ours. I think that we helped them with insights into policy development here. Part of the suspicion that we sometimes have of the European Union and its institutions would be allayed if we in this House could work out better mechanisms for interacting with the European Parliament, the Council of Ministers and the Commission. Notwithstanding the fact that we have now been a member of the European Union for almost a generation, we have not yet succeeded in that.

The International Development Committee will, I am sure, try to talk to Commissioners, officials and colleagues in the European Parliament at least once a year, but that is not a substitute for the rigorous, continuous involvement between this place and elsewhere in Europe which is necessary. We need to consider how we can improve that situation. As I came away from spending two days talking and listening to people in Europe, I had a clear feeling that there is a deficit, not in Europe's institutions but in the way in which the two places work together.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

Having participated in the debate on Second Reading and followed closely, through Hansard, the debate in Committee, I have been very impressed with the level of cross-party consensus on the Bill.

I fear, however, that on new clause 3 there is a danger of the good intentions that informed the Conservative party's support for the Bill running up against the intransigence of its general foreign and European policy. Its suggestion that Britain should be involved in multilateral aid—for example, through the European Commission—but that we should be able to exercise the threat of withdrawing that aid every time a project breaks down brings to mind that rather unsuccessful mantra about being in Europe but not run by Europe, which was repeated so many times before the last election. The Conservative party is playing the same record again and again.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I have said not once but three times that there is no question of withdrawing multilateral aid; we challenge the idea of giving more aid, especially for the reconstruction of Afghanistan, until we are satisfied that the reforms have really taken effect.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I rather suspected that I might become the fourth Member who has raised the issue with the hon. Lady to have my interpretation of her remarks corrected, and she has not disappointed me. She has, as she made clear, been challenged on this matter four times, and she has not yet ruled out the fact that the purpose of the new clause is to provide a lever controlling the distribution of multilateral aid whereby Britain could withdraw its participation in an individual project if we felt that there was a flaw in the management or delivery of aid.

Surely the whole point of multilateralism is that we pool our resources, and we must put our trust in the relevant institutions, which in this case includes the European Commission, to undertake proper monitoring and exercise effective control.

Just this morning, in European Standing Committee B, we had a long and very interesting debate about the way in which the European Commission monitors, through the Court of Auditors, the aid and assistance that has been given to the Palestinian Authority.

We discovered that there are many difficulties in the distribution of that aid which arise from the management structures and the effective co-ordination of the different agencies involved. Not least among those difficulties, of course, are the political situation and the deterioration of the security crisis in the middle east. Surely, however, it is the job of the Court of Auditors and the European Commission to exercise its judgment in relation to these matters. We must monitor that process, and there are mechanisms for doing so multilaterally to determine whether it is right to continue to make that aid available.

In the Committee this morning, some hon. Members felt that we should be cautious about giving further aid to the Palestinian Authority. I was not one of them; I think that we should be stepping up our aid in this instance. It would be wrong if we in the UK reduced our commitment to the European Union's strategy for stabilising the middle east through support for the Palestinian Authority simply because we had come to the view that we should be more cautious.

David Cairns (Labour, Greenock and Inverclyde)

I apologise to my hon. Friend because I have not been here for the whole debate, as I had another engagement. I suspect that he may have been referring to me when he spoke of some members of the European Standing Committee who take a slight hard-line view on this matter. I am sure that he will accept that the reservations of some hon. Members arise not from any lack of generosity or of a willingness to engage in the reconstruction of places such as Afghanistan and Palestine but from a desire to ensure that European taxpayers' money is well spent. We must have a rigorous monitoring system. The Court of Auditors does a good job, but it is of necessity done after the event. As the money is provided on a continuing basis, some of us feel that we need reassurance that the monitoring is taking place.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention but, Mr. Deputy Speaker, you will be pleased to hear that I will not try to rerun this morning's debate in European Standing Committee B. Suffice it to say that we were debating a report from the Court of Auditors and looking at the way in which the European Union monitors the distribution of its aid. The European Commission should do that monitoring, and I have every confidence that it can do so effectively. Of course, we also need to monitor the monitoring process itself.

Sometimes we tend to think that Britain is a special case in the European Union, but the point about multilateral organisations is that the relationships between individual member countries and the multilateral agencies must always be the same. How would a body such as the EU fare if any individual member state threatened to withdraw support every time it noticed that something was going wrong?

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

In answer to the hon. Gentleman's question, the EU agencies involved might not like what happened but the poor of the world might benefit because aid would be more effectively directed by a country that views the relief of poverty, rather than the pursuit of politics, as a priority.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

The hon. Gentleman is simply arguing that it would be better to give aid bilaterally than multilaterally. He seems to be saying that Britain is best; that we are best placed to know where money should be spent and how it should be spent; that we can monitor that spending and that we should not bother with multilateral organisations at all. If that is his position, it is not unreasonable, but I do not agree. The points made by the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge), who spoke for the Liberal Democrats, are salient. There is a big debate about multilateralism versus bilateralism, but I think that the multilateralists have won. If the hon. Gentleman wants to take us back to bilateralism, he will find it difficult to support the Bill.

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

I am not making a black and white case for bilateral or multilateral aid, but I suggest that if a multilateral agency is clearly failing in its objective to help the poor, a Government should have the right to consider whether to redirect that agency's aid and to do so effectively themselves to help the poor rather than play petty politics with the EU agencies.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I am extremely grateful for that intervention, which supports my interpretation of what the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) said from the Conservative Front Bench, although she denies that when challenged. Through the new clause, the Conservative party wants the ability to repatriate not just the aid, but the power to monitor and control its use. I submit that there is little difference between that and returning to bilateralism—a point made by many Members.

Such a situation would undermine not only British influence in the multilateral bodies—it is so important that our influence and the emphasis on poverty eradication within those bodies remain strong—but also the multilateral approach itself. Full engagement in the multilateral institutions is the way to ensure that multilateral programmes are effective. We should not isolate ourselves or threaten to withdraw from those institutions every time we spot an imperfection. That is why I hope that the Opposition will withdraw the motion.

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to speak in this important debate. Britain directs about 30 per cent. of its international aid through the EU. I support the new clause because the EU's overseas aid package is dominated by politics rather than concern for the poor, and because the little aid that is directed toward those most in need takes far too long to arrive.

I hope that reform will take root in the EU, but there is little doubt that political considerations dominate where and how it directs its aid. Why else does Poland receive twice as much aid as Latin America and Asia combined? Why else are the top 10 recipients numbered among eastern Europe, the Balkans and north Africa? In order of aid received, they are: Poland, the Czech Republic, Morocco, Romania, the Slovak Republic, Egypt, Bosnia- Herzegovina, Hungary, ex-Yugoslavia and Russia. Why else do Asia and Latin America combined receive only 12 per cent. of the EU overseas aid budget when a third of the people living in absolute poverty are in India alone?

This country allows nearly 30 per cent. of its overseas aid budget, which amounts to between £750 million and £800 million, to be directed through the EU. This country should therefore be ashamed of itself. We support an EU policy that, in effect, plays petty politics with the poor of the world, although the Government are aware of the problem.

The International Development Committee's second report, published in 2000, says:

"EC external assistance policies are clearly determined more by political priorities than poverty alleviation."

On 9 January, in response to my question, the Prime Minister could not deny that he was aware of the situation. I hope that the House will forgive me for quoting, but in answer to my written question, the Secretary of State was honest enough to say:

"Provisional figures for 2000 show that the percentage of EC development assistance spent in low-income countries continues to fall and is now below 50 per cent. This is unsatisfactory but difficult to change because many member states and large parts of the Commission support the distribution of aid for political rather than developmental purposes."—[Official Report, 19 December 2001; Vol. 377, c. 346W.]

I put it to this Government that we are elected to try to change things for the better. We are not here to accept matters that are unsatisfactory because they are too difficult to change.

The Government are clearly acquiescing in the shameful policy of politics over poverty. That policy is not only marked by dishonesty and hypocrisy, but is inefficient and ineffective, as the small amount of aid that reaches the genuine poor often arrives very late. According to the International Development Committee's paper entitled "The Effectiveness of EC Development Assistance", published in August 2000, the average length of project or programme implementation has continuously increased over the past few years. During the past five years, the average delay in disbursement of committed funds has increased from three to four and half years. The Committee concluded that that sort of backlog was untenable.

The Committee was told of a number of examples of delays and inefficiencies in disbursement. Population Concern gave the Committee two examples of such delays. The first was a delay of 13 months in the disbursement of funds for four mini-projects in Bolivia and Peru. In the second example—a community-based distribution programme in Karachi—the funding situation became so dire that the director of a local NGO in Pakistan took out a personal loan to pay staff salaries, using her residence as collateral. As a result, partner NGOs have requested that Population Concern should seek no financing from the European Community in future.

Britain has an enviable record, built up over many years and many Governments, when it comes to international aid, and our aid agencies enjoy a similar reputation. Yet the Government seem to be attempting to sacrifice our good name on the altar of the EU overseas aid package.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

The hon. Gentleman is keen to lecture this Government, but will he reflect on the position when his party was in government? Does he recall that the proportion of the aid budget going through the EU when the Conservative Government left office was not 30 per cent. but 50 per cent. and rising? The reason it was rising was the Conservative Government cuts to our bilateral aid. Why did not the Conservative Government take the sort of action that the Labour Government are taking, together with the Commission, to improve the quality of British aid, when they had the opportunity to do so?

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

I find Labour Members' tendency to try to cover up—

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

Answer the question.

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

I shall answer the question in my own way. Labour Members attempt to cover up their own failure by referring back to what happened five years previously and to the Conservative Government's record. I do not know about the hon. Gentleman, but I am more interested in the future than in the past. What is clear is that this Government, who are now in a position to do something about this, have done nothing about it in the past five years.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

The hon. Gentleman is generous enough to give way again. I simply make the point that these problems were manifest when his party was in government. Indeed, the problems were greater then, as a larger proportion of British aid went through the EU because the overall aid spend was lower, but the Conservative Government did nothing about it. We now have a Labour Government who, together with partners in other member states, are doing something about it. For instance, in May last year we got all the member states represented in the Council of Ministers to sign up to a declaration that poverty relief should be a prime goal of the EU aid programme. The Conservatives never did that, so we are making improvements. Will the hon. Gentleman support the Government in that?

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

Let me respectfully point out to the hon. Gentleman that the position with regard to the EU overseas aid package has been getting gradually worse. In 1987, for example, some 75 per cent. of the EU overseas aid package went to low-income countries. Today, that figure is 50 per cent. In reality, therefore, matters have been getting much worse in recent years. That is why it is important that the House focus its attention on the future rather than the past, and on what we can do to put matters right. There is no point in harking back to what happened five years ago. If anything, the situation is now worse and there is an even greater need for this Government, who have been in power for the past four and a half years, to put things right.

The Secretary of State has called the EU overseas aid package a "disgrace", yet it appears from press reports—I look forward to clarification of this when the Secretary of State addresses the House—that she has allowed the Government to distribute our Afghanistan reconstruction aid through the EU. That can only encourage the EU.

Meanwhile, the only target that the Government have published in their White Paper to measure the effectiveness of EU aid is for 2006. We must wait another four years before we can determine whether things are getting better. That is another four years during which money will be wasted, mismanagement will persist and lives will continue to be needlessly lost.

I believe that one of the main priorities of politics should be the relief of poverty, wherever it exists. I am sure that the vast majority of Members on both sides of the House agree: it is just that we differ as to the means of achieving that objective. When dealing with one of the most powerful tools to alleviate poverty, international aid, the Government allow the EU to play petty politics with the poor of the world. That shameful policy is costing lives today. We need the Government to act now to put that right before too many more lives are needlessly lost. I hope and pray that that happens. I remind the Government that actions speak louder than words. If they refuse to support new clause 3, they will be sending out a clear message that they are not prepared to act.

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

We have had an interesting debate. The hon. Member for Billericay (Mr. Baron) did the House a great service by drawing attention to the decline in the poverty focus of EU development spending, which is a real problem. We are well aware of that. As my hon. Friend the Member for City of York (Hugh Bayley) said, these problems have been going on for some time. They are a product of the priority that has been given to the foreign policy interests of EU member states—these decisions are taken collectively—instead of focusing on poverty. The Government have succeeded in persuading the EU that its development aid programme should have a poverty focus.

As the Chairman of the International Development Committee, the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry), said, the process of reform has begun. We had an extremely good debate this morning in European Standing Committee B—hon. Members will be pleased to hear that I do not propose to repeat my contribution. We talked at some length about the progress that is being made, but we also recognised that there is a lot more to be done.

Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat, North Norfolk)

I recognise that the process of reform has started. However, I read in the Library research paper on the Bill that, back in November 2000, the Development Council made its declaration that the principal aim must be the reduction of poverty. It decided that there must be an action plan and constant monitoring of progress through an annual report. Today, I rang up the man in charge, Mr. Eliopoulos, to find out where these annual reports were, and I discovered that there is no annual report for 2000 or 2001. Nothing has yet been published. That does not make me very confident that progress is being made, certainly not on monitoring. Can the Minister tell us what will happen with those reports, and how much progress has been made?

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

My recollection is that there was a first shot at a report that went to the Development Council in November, but the Commission recognised that it was an incomplete and imperfect document. One of the practical steps we are taking is to work with officials in the Commission to find ways in which effective monitoring of the spending of EU aid can be undertaken in future and be reported to future Council meetings. There is not the experience that there might have been. We have something to offer, along with other member states that share our concern about the lack of a poverty focus, and we are interested in practical steps to make progress.

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

Will the Minister give way?

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

Yes I will, but I want to make progress.

John Baron (Conservative, Billericay)

I have taken the Minister's points on board, but why are we waiting until 2006 to get a progress report on these new policy initiatives and reforms, when we could ask for such a report in a year's time? Why do we not speed things up? Why are we waiting another four years?

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

We are not waiting, because the Government are actively involved in supporting the European Union and the Commission in carrying forward the reform process. I was interested by the remarks of the hon. Member for Banbury, who has been with the Select Committee in Brussels for two days. We will see what the International Development Committee report actually says. The hon. Gentleman recognised that progress is being made. I am however almost the first—my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State would be ahead of me in the queue—to recognise that the proof will be in the delivery of the change. We think the commitment is there, and the mechanisms have begun to be established; but all of us, in all parts of the House, want to see the change take place.

I do not know about the reports in the papers to which the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) referred, but I can confirm what my hon. Friend the Member for City of York said. The £200 million in the bilateral contribution to aid for Afghanistan will come from the DFID budget; the EC is making its own contribution from resources for Afghanistan's reconstruction. Only our contribution to the European development fund comes within the purview of the Bill. The EC development aid budget category 4 and pre-accession spending—also raised in the debate—are subject to the European Communities Act 1972.

We share, unquestioningly, the objective of a greater focus on poverty, but the new clause is both unnecessary and undesirable. It is unnecessary because any assistance provided by the Secretary of State under clause 1 and any contribution made under clause 4 are subject to the requirement that she be satisfied of the likelihood of their contributing to a reduction of poverty. That is so whether she acts herself or through third parties, under clause 4 or clause 8. The Bill therefore provides for the test sought by the hon. Lady.

As for the undesirability of the new clause, the most important point is that the Secretary of State's power to provide assistance in response to a disaster or other emergency is not constrained by the poverty requirement, and should not be so.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

May I put to the Minister the question put to me by the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Roger Casale)? If the Secretary of State was not satisfied that the criteria in clause 1 were being met, would she be prepared to withhold funds on a multilateral basis if they did not accord with the focus?

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

The Secretary of State could do that under the Bill as it is currently worded, although contributions to the European Union involving moneys covered by the European Communities Act 1972 are not subject to its provisions.

The real difficulty is that the new clause would impose a constraint, in that whenever the Secretary of State gave assistance to third parties in response to a disaster or other emergency—and I am afraid that "third parties" includes non-governmental organisations—she would have to be satisfied that the granting of that relief would contribute to the reduction of poverty. I cannot believe that that was the hon. Lady's intention. Such legislation would mean, for instance, that before deciding to authorise the granting of emergency relief following the volcanic eruption in Goma, the Secretary of State would have had to ask herself whether it would contribute to the reduction of poverty. Such deliberation might cause delay, which is of course wholly undesirable.

There are other examples. In 1999, there was a mudslide in Venezuela. We gave support through third parties to assist humanitarian relief. Some of the mudslide affected wealthier districts of the capital. If the new clause were adopted, it would mean, in effect, that the Secretary of State should not give such support through third parties, because it would be hard to prove that it favoured the reduction of poverty. Another instance is the help that we gave, again through third parties, following the Turkish earthquake. Turkey is not a low-income country.

Another unintended effect of the new clause is that any aid given to overseas territories by third parties would be subject to the poverty test, which we have specifically excluded from the aid that we give overseas territories under the Bill because other factors need to be taken into account. Again, I am sure that the hon. Lady would not intend the new clause to have this effect, but the overseas territories would be alarmed to hear that any aid or support that they received from third parties, multilateral institutions and international financial institutions was subject to the poverty requirement.

Finally, as other hon. Members have said, the new clause would create difficulties by constraining the Secretary of State's ability to honour our obligations to pay contributions and subscriptions to multilateral financial institutions.

We accept the principle. The Bill seeks to give the Secretary of State the necessary power to ensure that she can carry that principle through but, with great respect, the new clause is defective because it would have all those adverse consequences. For that reason, I hope that the hon. Lady will decide not to press it.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

It is not until we debate new clauses in this way that we are able to place on the record the principles that we are trying to defend and our good intentions in tabling them, and to dispel any myths about those intentions. I hope that we have succeeded in achieving that.

I am sure that the Minister is under no illusions. We feel strongly about acting on the warnings following the Select Committee investigations into the way in which multilateral aid is disbursed by, among other third parties, the European Union. It is perhaps worth putting on record the fact that there is no desire to fall into the trap of adversely affecting NGOs, whose work in relation to international development we support.

The unforeseen consequence exposed by the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Roger Casale) may lead to a myth being perpetrated that there is an intention on the part of Conservatives to repatriate our multilateral funding. I hope that that has been scotched effectively, but lest there should be any doubt left, and to make it impossible to place that interpretation on our intentions, and to avoid the unforeseen consequences that the Minister has set out and which arise from humanitarian assistance being referred to under new clause 3, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Order for Third Reading read.

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

As has been said many times during the passage of the Bill, it is simple but profoundly important. As the House knows, the reduction of poverty has been the guiding principle of all United Kingdom development assistance since 1997. It is right, therefore, that that principle should be established in legislation.

One in five of the 6 billion people with whom each of us shares this planet still live in conditions of extreme poverty, with shortened lives, inadequate food, lack of education, health care, clean water and sanitation; 10 million children die each year from malnourishment and preventable illness; 500,000 women die during child birth for lack of simple medical help; 800 million people cannot read or write; and 113 million children of primary age can get no education because they have no classroom and no teacher.

With the abundance and knowledge that exist in the world, it should shame and disgrace us that such poverty and inequality continue. So long as we fail as a world community to deal with such division and inequality in our increasingly globalised world, we will never achieve the stability that each of us wishes to be able to pass on to the next generation.

Following the events since 11 September, there is much greater understanding of the force of that argument. As the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry) said on Second Reading, there is a window of opportunity. I agree with that wholeheartedly. It is an opportunity that we must seize.

The Bill makes poverty reduction the test of what we do, and it ends tied aid. There is now an all-party agreement that tied aid has had its day in the UK, and will not return in any form.

The Bill ensures that we can provide effective humanitarian assistance and allows us to promote good governance, to support security sector reform, to encourage conflict resolution and prevention, and to support financial management reform. It continues to offer support to our overseas territories.

I shall be brief, as the Bill has twice been through this House and the other place over the past 12 months. I want to place on record my thanks to all the hon. Members who have contributed to our debates—on Second Reading, in Committee and again this evening. Whatever has divided us, it is clear from our discussions that there is a deep concern among hon. Members of all parties for the cause of international development. That has been reflected in the constructive spirit of our discussions at all stages.

For those reasons, and in that spirit, I commend the Bill to the House.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

I begin by reaffirming that the Opposition fully support the aims of the Bill. We have supported the Bill through all its stages and I hope that the Minister will accept that, on Second Reading, in Committee and on Report, our approach has been constructive and in the spirit of the Bill.

Certainly, I want to place on record the contribution that has been made by Sir John Vereker, permanent secretary to the Department. Today, he addressed the all-party parliamentary group on overseas development, and that was an unfortunate clash of timing. There have been almost too many goodies on offer today for those hon. Members with a passionate interest in international development. It was not possible to be in two places at once, but I am sure that the Minister will join me in placing on record our thanks for the work that Sir John has done in his career with the Department. To some extent, he played the role of midwife in bringing the Bill into being. We wish him well in retirement, and his successor well in assuming his role.

The events in Afghanistan provide an interesting backdrop for the debate on the Bill's effectiveness. We must consider what help can be given to Afghanistan, which is now defined, regrettably, as a failed state. I hate the term "failed state", but it has caught on. It does not match the spirit that I detected in the Afghan aid workers whom I met on a recent visit to Pakistan. The quality that characterises the Afghan people is their resilience. I have every confidence that, with the right assistance from countries such as ours, Afghanistan will get back on its feet. However, that will require the sort of commitment, focus and contribution that have been at the very heart of our discussions of the Bill.

Since my visit to Pakistan, I have become even more convinced that international development needs to be high on the political agenda. It is in some ways depressing that it takes a disaster to make people take notice of international development. I told the Secretary of State that one of my aims was to help her keep international development high on the agenda.

We need to tackle failed states before they fail, and we need to tackle the grinding poverty that brings them to that condition. I hope that the Bill confirms Britain's commitment to tackling global poverty.

Afghanistan is not the only example facing us. Around the world, poverty is intertwined with the absence of education, decent health care and human rights. It is right that the Department for International Development should tackle poverty. If other countries and institutions adopted similar strategies, the millennium targets for changing things would be much more firmly within our grasp.

We touched on the role of the EU in our discussion of new clause 3. The EU is the sixth-largest donor of official development assistance, and the second-largest multilateral donor, in the world. However, it has not focused its development effort on the poorest countries. It has only recently announced the need to focus on poverty. We pay tribute to the Secretary of State's role in helping to bring about a shift. The lion's share of the European Union's aid budget still goes to help countries in the Mediterranean, the Balkans, central and eastern Europe and north Africa. I accept that there are huge numbers of relatively poor people in those areas, but if we are serious about tackling global poverty there needs to be a drastic change of focus.

From Commissioner Patten I gain the impression that the will is there but that it will take a long time and much effort before there will be any major improvements in the budget. I know that the Select Committee on International Development maintains constant scrutiny of the progress of the reform of the European aid budget, but I urge the Secretary of State to keep a firm hold on the powers that the Bill will confer on her to ensure that multilateral giving is used in a way that chimes with the Bill's overall focus and objective.

In our deliberations in Committee, we did our level best to persuade the Government that more attention needed to be paid to the whole issue of reconstruction. I remember the serious reservations that the Minister expressed on that point. He said that if reconstruction were an explicit objective mentioned in the Bill, it could have the possible consequence of breaking the bank in terms of international development. However, before we leave discussion of the Bill I want to re-register with the Minister the fact that it is part of the new policy of the Conservative party that a successful refugee policy must include a commitment to reconstruction in those countries where, as a result of man-made or humanitarian disaster, the population is faced with problems of the type that are manifest in Afghanistan now. I remain concerned that the Minister's answer to me—that such an objective could not be incorporated in the Bill—left hanging in mid-air the question about the ultimate responsibility for reconstruction: with which Government Department does that rest? That remained an unanswered question, and in a way it remains unanswered today. It will be a very stern test of joined-up government in future if our fine words on the need to reconstruct Afghanistan are to have real, practical success in that country.

We have of course had reservations about the Bill. We were worried that many worthy projects—projects to build up civil society and good governance—would not be eligible for funding under the Bill or in future, and we have tried to have them explicitly mentioned in the Bill, lest those very important areas should suffer future neglect. The Secretary of State and the Minister have both said several times during the Bill's passage that their funding status is secure. I hope that officials in their Department will bear that in mind when allocating funding.

We have also tried to make the Bill reflect the need for greater accountability. The performance of the Department would inevitably improve if it constantly measured its progress against specific targets and if that performance was more open to the scrutiny of the House. Our amendments may not have been made, but I hope that the Secretary of State has taken their import on board.

Lastly, if we are truly to tackle global poverty, Government as a whole need to take development seriously. The Government need to re-energise their commitment to reform of the common agricultural policy, which currently holds out considerable economic opportunities for developing nations. When the Department of Trade and Industry is giving consideration to export credit guarantees, it needs to think seriously about development issues. We were very disappointed in that respect when our amendment on sustainable development to the Export Control Bill was not accepted.

We were disappointed that the Government did not feel able to support our amendment to make the seeking of poverty reduction a focus across all Government Departments, because we believe that, using joined-up government, we could be much more effective with that focus.

To an extent, our disquiet was vindicated in the example of the Tanzanian air traffic control system which attracted attention in December, when, against the recommendations of the World Bank and others, a British system was sold to Tanzania at what the World Bank regarded as an inappropriately high cost. Most important, what happened to the good intentions to direct resources in countries that we have relieved of debt to health and education rather than defence procurement? In that Tanzanian test, the Government seem to have fallen at the first fence.

Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat, North Norfolk)

Will the hon. Lady give way?

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

No. I am about to conclude my speech, and the hon. Gentleman will have an opportunity to make his own contribution to this debate.

I reiterate that we support the Bill, despite our reservations. At the beginning of a new century, it would be a brilliant achievement if this century could be associated with great progress not just for the developed world but for the developing world. I hope that the Bill will enable Britain to play a full part.

Tony Worthington (Labour, Clydebank and Milngavie)

I agree with what the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman), who speaks for the Opposition, said earlier about Sir John Vereker. It is a remarkable achievement to have been involved with the Overseas Development Administration in the 1960s, to have been private secretary to three Overseas Development Ministers in the 1970s and then to have held the post of permanent secretary for eight or nine years. It is a fitting tribute to him that today, when he is about to leave, the Bill has made so much progress towards becoming an Act, showing that the Department for International Development has come of age. I wish Sir John well in Bermuda—hard work, but some one has to do it.

I had the opportunity to chair a meeting at which Sir John Vereker spoke, and one of the things that he pointed out, which is very important to this debate, was the importance of a Department having a single, uncluttered focus. The Bill is about having such a focus—the reduction of poverty. Of course, the Opposition have sought to clutter, and that is very tempting, but the lack of a single, uncluttered purpose was the reason why aid got into so many difficulties in the past—it was why we got into difficulties, and it was why the European Union got into difficulties as well.

People kept on trying to add their own focus—all very worthy, but it produced the inequities of tied aid. People said, "Here's something good to export. Let us find something that is reasonable to use it for in a developing country," whereas the interests of the developing countries and the poorest people in them should have been the driving force.

The biggest tribute to the Department, the Secretary of State, the Minister and all those of us in this country associated with development is the power of the idea of reducing poverty—it is now taking over everywhere in development. One sees that poverty focus at the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and throughout Europe; it is the driving force to reforming the European approach to development.

In wishing the Bill good speed, I want to mention the Select Committee's latest visit to Europe, which was referred to earlier. Let us not forget that the Select Committee on International Development now exists, and it is not on the margins as it was under those newly wise Conservative Members. Let us also remember that, whereas the department was an aid agency, it is now a development ministry. That is crucial. Whom did we see on that visit to Europe? We saw the Commissioners or senior representatives of three Directorates-General. We saw the foreign affairs people, the development people and the trade people, and they knew where we were coming from. They spoke the same language as us. We saw the representatives of a French Trade Commissioner and it was remarkable that they spoke about a poverty focus and—let us whisper it—about reducing the subsidies made under the common agricultural policy. They were already responsible for the everything but arms initiative.

Because of this Department and this Secretary of State, we get a single, uncluttered focus on the reduction of poverty everywhere we go. I wish the Bill well.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

I congratulate Sir John Vereker on his retirement, but I particularly wish to thank him for being very patient with me when I was a member of the Select Committee. I used to regard him as the senior tutor of the set-up who would always take a little bit longer to explain to a rather difficult Liberal Democrat what she had not understood. He is a great man and I thank him and all the civil servants in the Department for International Development.

I am delighted that the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry), the Chairman of the Select Committee, is not a member of the Liberal Democrats. However, I remind him that he has the best job in the House of Commons and I wish him luck. I hope that he enjoys his work.

The Bill is all about sustainable development. The phrase has come to haunt me; I dream about sustainable development. The phrase sums up everything that we want and need. As many Members will know, my obsession when we started to consider the Bill was tied aid. I could not believe that the Bill was dealing with the subject. I was tutored by civil servants and other Members and we gradually established that the phrase "sustainable development" would eliminate tied aid for ever. I welcome that, and I am beginning to believe it.

However, sustainable development and what the Bill can achieve depend on other Departments. Let them—and especially the Department of Trade and Industry and the Export Credits Guarantee Department—not forget about sustainable development. Their activities often conflict with those of the Department for International Development. I shall not cite the famous examples, because I am sure that other Members will.

On humanitarian aid, I am constantly worried—I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure me—about DFID having to spend its budget on clearing up messes. It had to spend a certain amount of money on humanitarian aid and reconstruction after the Kosovo action. I remember having many battles about that and receiving reassurances from the Secretary of State that much of that money came out of the Treasury's contingency funds.

I object when the budget that is meant for the poorest people in the world has to clear up messes that we have often created. Therefore, although I appreciate that the humanitarian aid for Afghanistan has come out of DFID's budget, will the money for reconstruction come from its budget or can we twist the Treasury's arm to make it come from its contingency reserves? It is important that we do not always fall back on DFID's budget to fund reconstruction, particularly after military action.

My other plea is that humanitarian aid should also go towards basic primary education. I gave the example of southern Sudan, which has had 40 years of civil war, with just one short break. Two, coming up to three, generations have not had the opportunity of receiving primary education. A very low percentage of boys, let alone girls, are in education. It is important in chronic civil war situations that we do not just deliver humanitarian aid. We have to look a little more to the future.

Primary education is a simple thing to deliver. It does not need massive infrastructure. Southern Sudan does not even need schools and classrooms. I saw classes taking place under trees. The children need teachers, slates, chalk and a few books that can be carried off with the people of the village if the war and the raiders suddenly return. The Department should reconsider its policy and include education in humanitarian aid.

We have heard some fine speeches over the past few weeks, especially since 11 September. We have even been subjected to the Chancellor of the Exchequer doing the most tremendous things on the debt front and saying remarkable things about a global health fund and how we must all pull together. We heard a magnificent speech from the Prime Minister when he was teaching the world to sing at his party conference. I am being genuine. I honestly believe that he is sincere in his attempts to bring the world together and to do something about poverty. I was also subjected to an equally marvellous speech by ex-President Clinton in the Elizabeth II centre across the road.

Everyone is talking about doing something to tackle the huge poverty gap in the world, but what we are putting into action is a bit lamentable. I congratulate the Government on bringing the proportion of gross national product that is spent on aid up to, I think, 0.33 per cent., but at that rate it will be 50 years before we achieve the UN target of 0.7 per cent. I urge them to move a little faster.

I think that I heard the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) question whether percentage of GNP, or whatever it is called nowadays, is the appropriate way to measure the aid that is given to developing countries. That has been agreed by the UN and I thought that we all accepted it. I know that the United States of America is beginning to quibble and that it is saying that it is the amount of cash that matters, not the proportion of GNP. I should like the hon. Lady to clarify her position on that.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

It is simply that percentages can be misleading. When an economy is growing, it is possible in cash terms to put more money in and at the same time to have a lower percentage of gross domestic product because of the growth in the economy. The trouble with all statistics is that they are used in favour or disfavour of the argument that one is promoting. For that reason, I urge a word of caution. The percentage of GDP has to be considered in conjunction with the underlying trend in the growth of the economy if one is to understand properly what the size of the contribution really means.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

Yes, I thought that that was what the hon. Lady said, so I did not misunderstand her, and I thank her for re-emphasising it. However, that moves us away from the age-old principle, which for me is the 11th commandment, of "from each according to his means, to each according to their need". The hon. Lady's approach means that it is possible not to bother about the rest of the world; that when an economy is performing badly, we can forget about aid because it does not matter. The percentage of GNP is a basic principle and I am amazed that the Conservatives are abandoning it.

Simon Thomas (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

I share the hon. Lady's amazement given recent debates in the Chamber about the amount of money that was put into Railtrack as a percentage of GDP and the Conservative party's claims about how well it did compared with the Labour party. Does she agree that although the outstanding commitment dates back to about 1974, it was last reiterated at the Rio conference in 1992 when the Conservatives were in government? What was good enough for that Conservative Government is surely good enough for the Conservative Front Bench now.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his helpful intervention. Tonight, we have witnessed, if not the earth moving, certainly a huge shift in Conservative policy on the delivery of aid and, indeed, their concept of raising taxes, which seems to be changing.

I shall conclude, briefly, with the United States of America. If any country is guilty of not giving a proper proportion of its income, sadly it is the USA. The country currently contributes 0.1 per cent of its income, and is grizzling about it.

Nick Hawkins (Conservative, Surrey Heath)

The point that the hon. Lady has just made demonstrates her shaky grasp of elementary mathematics and statistics. One cannot measure things simply by percentages because the United States of America, the greatest free democracy in the world, gives a vast amount in cash terms. Saying that that is 0.1 per cent. is a silly argument.

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

I shall not respond to that ludicrous intervention. The hon. Gentleman obviously does not understand the concept of progressive taxation—I think that that is what it is called—or percentages, which I learned about in primary school, as I am sure many hon. Members did.

In recent months, the Americans have shown a lack of concern for the rest of the world. They have withdrawn from the Kyoto agreement, have not signed up to the land mines treaty or the International Criminal Court, and are withdrawing from the anti-ballistic missile treaty. We understand that they are unhappy about the target of 0.7 per cent. which has been set by the United Nations. In the two months in which they prosecuted the bombing of Afghanistan, they spent about a quarter of their annual aid budget. It appears to me—I hope that I am wrong—that the USA does not give a pretzel for the poor of this planet.

Caroline Spelman (Conservative, Meriden)

Since the record will be read tomorrow, may I make a factual point? Is the hon. Lady aware that the United States was the largest donor of aid to Afghanistan prior to 11 September?

Jenny Tonge (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park)

Yes, I was, but that contribution does not prove anything; we go back to the argument about each giving according to his means. The Americans are not giving in proportion to their country's income; through their policies, they give the appearance—that is how it seems to my constituents and me—of not pulling their weight.

We must put all the fine words that we have heard in recent months into action. For the sake of future generations, we must address the poverty gap world wide and give every child the chance of education and a better life, not just those children who are lucky enough to be born in the west. If we do not do so as a matter of urgency, we shall condemn our children and grandchildren to many more wars, terrorist activity and poverty.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

The Bill is excellent and will come to be seen as a landmark Bill, underpinning the new approach to the delivery of aid and development assistance; it may not be necessary to sing its praises, but we must certainly embrace it at the start of the 21st century. It is not idle to speculate that the ambition of eradicating poverty will come to have the same symbolic and practical significance in this century as the drive to eradicate slavery did in the 19th century, and the drive to eradicate disease did in the last century. We must always remember that the great battles of the past are never won for good; even today, there are worrying signs of the re-emergence of slavery in certain parts of the world. Many murderous diseases that plagued the developing world in the early and mid-20th century are returning as well.

Each generation sets its sights on a new international agenda. Each tries to set its sights higher. The Bill represents the determination of our generation to act decisively and effectively to eradicate poverty. I believe that that aspiration will form the foundation of our development efforts for many generations to come. It is an aspiration that has grown not only out of the world of politics, although politics will be very important in advancing the cause. The determination to eradicate poverty is an expression of a deeply felt desire for a greater measure of social justice throughout the world. I believe that that desire is felt by the vast majority of decent, thinking people in our country.

I join other hon. Members in paying tribute to the work of Sir John Vereker, who, rather like William Wilberforce in the 19th century, decided to live in Wimbledon when he had work to do in London and at Westminster, although he has been there for a little longer than Wilberforce decided to stay. We should also pay tribute to the work of church and other faith groups, non-governmental organisations and the growing body of academic work on international development, which has helped to establish the paramount nature of the principle of eradicating poverty, not least through the work of the international philosopher and holder of the Nobel prize for economics, Amartya Sen.

The Bill will put the United Kingdom in a leading position in relation to international development issues. We will have a much stronger voice in the world on how we need to respond internationally to globalisation and on how globalisation should be made to work for the world's poor.

Of course, there is still a great deal of work to be done on refining and making more exact the definition of sustainable development. Although an important feature of the Bill is the fact that we are breaking the link between aid and trade—there will no longer be tied aid in that sense—many of us would like to tie across other Departments the concept of sustainable development as we find it in the Bill and in the work of the Department. It could then be a leitmotiv that would help to give substance to our aspiration of ensuring a co-ordinated approach across Departments to trade and development issues, while never losing sight of the importance of tackling social justice as a means of securing stability and peace in areas of conflict around the world.

One thing has become much clearer as a result of the passage of the Bill: the central importance of a multilateral approach. I hope that, with the confidence that the Bill provides, the Government will continue to build on their work and strengthen our efforts to transform international institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

All of us can take pride in the introduction of the Bill and the new direction that it will give to our efforts to eradicate poverty around the world. I commend the further passage of the Bill to the House. 8.38 pm

Tony Baldry (Conservative, Banbury)

One of the very few benefits of the last general election was that it meant that the Bill had to be brought before the House for a second time. That provided the opportunity for a number of further speeches, commitments and contributions to be made on international development, which, in the usual course of parliamentary business, is an area of policy that is all too rarely debated on the Floor of the House.

We all agree that we need a clear poverty focus in international development. The statistics on those who live in poverty are sometimes so large that they are almost impossible to comprehend and the numbers of people involved are almost unimaginable. The United Nations says that 600 million children—almost one in four of the world's children—now live in absolute poverty. Nearly 200 million children under five weigh less than they should, and more than 130 million children of primary school age are not in school. It is difficult to grasp such statistics.

The wider picture is similarly bleak, with 1.2 billion people living on one US dollar a day. The same number of people lack access to safe drinking water, and 2.4 billion have inadequate access to sanitation.

Recent events have provided an opportunity. I do not want to make partisan points because those of us who are concerned about international development must try to explain to and impress upon many others that unless we bear down on poverty in the world, many other problems will not be overcome. To reduce poverty, we need clear objectives that everyone can easily understand. I shall therefore bang on for a few minutes about the need to try to meet the 0.7 per cent. target.

I shall read Hansard carefully tomorrow because I was not entirely sure what my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) was saying. Of course, I understand the arguments about cash and that if we have an economy that is growing in cash terms, the aid budget can increase. To be fair, I took such lines at the Dispatch Box when I was a junior Minister in the Foreign Office. I was not convinced by them then and I am not convinced now. However, their great weakness is that they constitute a political shorthand that hon. Members understand but does not grab our constituents and make them more willing and determined to support international development.

There is a danger that our constituents perceive international development in only two ways. First, when a major disaster occurs, such as events in Afghanistan and the recent volcanic eruption, they understand the need for humanitarian relief. Secondly, they hear about international development when stories appear about corruption in development aid budgets. We must try to grab people's attention and engage them so that they understand the need for a sustained campaign to ensure that the whole world gives more to development aid.

If developing countries fail to reach the 2015 targets, it is largely because developed countries do not give enough. That is not a criticism of the UK, which recently increased its aid budget. We are now the third largest donor according to the Development Assistance Committee statistics. We were fourth. However, with an aid budget of 0.33 per cent. of GDP, we have some way to go.

The Select Committee visited the institutions of the European Union yesterday. We learned that the Community had had to raid almost every cupboard, nook and cranny to pay for the commitments to Afghanistan that were made in Tokyo. If a similar crisis occurs, the cupboard is bare. If Somalia, Sudan or any other countries that are in difficulty need significant help and support, the money is not available from one of the wealthiest multilateral organisations in the world. We must therefore make a commitment to meet the 0.7 per cent. target.

The Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer have recently made speeches about international development. The Prime Minister has spoken about Africa, and he made a speech in India at the new year. The Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke at the Federal Reserve Bank. Hon. Members will have read most if not all those speeches. They are all welcome speeches that seek to establish a new partnership in Africa. In fairness, however, they will be but words if they are not matched by an increase in the financial commitment to international development. Those of us who are concerned about international development need to make as much noise as we can, in this Chamber and elsewhere, to ensure that the needs of the developing world are not forgotten when the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and others take into account the various pressures that they have to consider, and divvy up resources.

We now have an ideal opportunity to persuade colleagues and friends in other wealthy countries that they can afford to make a greater contribution to development aid. I shall read with care in Hansard tomorrow what my hon. Friends have said about the United States. Yes, the United States gives a considerable amount of development aid, in total cash terms. That is not surprising; it is a huge economy, and the wealthiest nation in the world. It is also, however, a fairly parsimonious provider, giving only 0.1 per cent. Now is the time for us collectively to engage with colleagues and friends in Congress, and to persuade them that this is an ideal opportunity for the wealthier nations of the world to engage with developing nations and substantially to increase their funding for international development assistance.

I am not sure what phrase one could find, other than "failing states", to describe certain countries. I appreciate that it is not a reflection on the individuals in those countries, who often have to deal with the consequences of daily grinding poverty. Indeed, huge numbers of people do that with a nobility of spirit that humbles many of us. However, the fact is that in far too many parts of the world, civil society has almost entirely collapsed. It was interesting to ask leading members of the European institutions to name countries in Africa, for example, that could be held up as illustrations of success. There are all too few success stories in Africa at the moment, and all too many tragedies. Many of us have almost completely lost track of the tragedies occurring in countries such as Somalia and Sudan, because they are so horrific, they seem to have been going on for so long, and they are just so grim.

Recent events have provided us with the opportunity not only to put international development far higher up the international agenda but to say to those who elect us, our fellow citizens, that it is in all our interests that we should invest more in the developing world. We all deal with political shorthand. The target of 0.7 per cent. that was set some 30 years ago is a piece of political shorthand that we can all understand. It is not the most elegant figure—0.7 per cent.—but it must be possible for hon. Members to find consensus on a line to take on when we could hope, collectively, to meet that target.

Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat, North Norfolk)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Tony Baldry (Conservative, Banbury)

No, I want to want to finish this point.

I am not expecting the Chancellor of the Exchequer to say that he can meet the target in the next spending round, but I would have thought that we could establish consensus that we should aim to meet the target of 0.7 per cent. by a particular date. I hope that we are in agreement that our development policies need to be poverty focused. Well, we have willed the policy. Can we not now, between us, collectively will the means to ensure that it can be achieved?

Simon Thomas (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

The second book in the "Dark Materials" trilogy which has just won Philip Pullman the Whitbread prize is "The Subtle Knife", and we have just seen the subtle knife exercised by the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry) on the arguments of his own Front-Bench colleagues. I hope that his subtle admonition was effective.

I rise to give the Bill my strong support and that of my colleagues in Plaid Cymru and the Scottish National party. I am pleased that the Bill is proceeding through its stages in the House. As hon. Members have said, all parties have supported the Bill, worked to improve it and have tabled amendments to tease out arguments from the Government. On the whole, that has been a beneficial process, twice over.

I am a little disappointed by the only flaw that I see in the Bill, which is that it does not contain a better definition of sustainable development. During its first passage through the House, I moved an amendment to use the Brundtland definition. At that time, the Government said that there are too many definitions, it is hard to keep track of them all and each one has its failings as well as its advantages, so we should stick with what we have got.

Labour Members and the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge) have talked about the importance of sustainable development as a tool for reducing poverty. However, I am still concerned that we do not have a fuller definition of sustainable development. There is talk of the goal of sustainable development being rolled out to all Departments, and I am worried that we will have too many different definitions working in too many different ways.

I predict that sustainable development will be included in future Bills, not only those on international development but those relating to work within the United Kingdom. I predict that several different definitions will be used, and we will have to return to the matter in a few years and draft a composite definition for the Government to use. Apart from that the Bill is excellent and it will provide a framework for the Secretary of State and her Ministers to achieve poverty reduction targets.

I agree with the hon. Member for Clydebank and Milngavie (Tony Worthington) that amendments tabled by Conservative Members had one particular failing. They were good amendments in the sense that they addressed issues of the day. Those are issues that should be addressed and on which the Executive should be challenged. However, they should not be included in the Bill because it sets up a framework for robust work towards poverty reduction over 10 or 15 years. Lumbering ourselves with issues specifically to do with Burma, Zimbabwe or anywhere else would have proved somewhat restrictive.

It is the task of all hon. Members, particularly those on the Opposition Benches, to hold the Government to account. They have said that they will achieve poverty reduction through sustainable development, that the Bill will get rid of tied aid and that they will work towards good governance. It is our job to hold the Government to account on the aims that they have set themselves in debates on the Bill.

We must now move on to the next stage of international development, which, as the hon. Member for Banbury said, is to achieve cross-party consensus on reaching a contribution target of 0.7 per cent. of GDP. I was hoping that we would achieve that consensus, although there may be a question mark hanging over those on the Conservative Front Bench. Certainly when I questioned the Secretary of State at the last International Development Question Time, she seemed to be open to the idea that there should be a timetable and that it is no longer good enough to have an open-ended commitment to an international treaty obligation that we have never fulfilled.

Of course, I accept the argument that richer countries pay more even if they pay a smaller proportion of their GDP. One of the countries that I am aware has reached its target of 0.7 per cent. is Luxembourg, and I am sure that it gives less than we do in our 0.33 per cent. of GDP. Nevertheless, the people of Luxembourg understand that they, as part of the rich west, are sharing a proportion of their wealth with developing countries. We have to aspire to be like Luxembourg. It is an interesting task for us to aspire to be like the smallest country in the European Union. I hope, in good time, that Wales will join Luxembourg as one of the smaller members of the EU. We must move forward to fulfil that obligation and reach that target. That is the only blot on the Government's copy book in this regard and they have done excellent work on debt reduction, which is another issue altogether.

The Bill represents the first genuine assessment of international development aid for about 20 years and it may provide a robust framework that lasts another 20, although I hope that the fact that this is our second attempt to legislate does not mean that it must last 40.

I leave the Minister with this thought: the proposal on annual reports was rejected, but we have a better framework for international development aid debates and that should enable us to achieve a better understanding of the progress that the Government are making towards the international poverty reduction targets.

Let there be instituted in the House of Commons an annual debate so that we can hold the Government to account, feed in our ideas and study practice elsewhere. As much as possible, we must work on the basis of cross-party consensus.

Hugh Bayley (Labour, City of York)

In order to be brief, I shall not repeat any arguments made by the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry) about the figure of 0.7 per cent. I simply say that Labour Members share his view that it would be helpful to have a timetable against which to measure the Government's aspiration to reach the target. They are moving in the right direction, but we need more clarity as to the time scale. That view was expressed by the Select Committee, of which I am a member, and we eagerly await the Secretary of State's response. We wish her good luck in her discussions with other Ministers, who obviously need to be consulted about the matter.

It is music to my ears to hear such a clear cross-party consensus on the importance of a poverty focus in aid. Of course, that consensus did not always exist. When I introduced a Bill to amend the Conservatives' Overseas Development and Co-operation Act 1980 and put a poverty focus in our aid programme for the first time, I did not receive the wholehearted support of all Members.

It was the father of my hon. Friend the Minister who said that when new proposals are made they are usually ignored—they were in my case—and then derided. However, if the proposals are good, the mood changes over time. Eventually, everybody says they agreed all along and that they are a good idea.

I simply say "well done" to the Secretary of State, her Department and her Government colleagues. It is terrific that the legislation is before the House and I hope that it reaches the statute book shortly. Of course, legislation is simply a means to an end, not an end in itself. It will provide a clearer focus on the need for our Government to support global efforts to work to, and reach, the vital anti-poverty international development targets by 2015.

I wish the Government good luck in their endeavours to ensure that those crucial goals are attained and good luck in their negotiations with our allies and friends in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the European Union. They, too, must make substantial contributions if the targets are to be met.

Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat, North Norfolk)

Like other Members, I begin by making clear my strong support for the Bill. As a new Member of the House, I was delighted to debate it while serving on my first Standing Committee. Its objectives are laudable and it rightly has at its heart the concept of poverty reduction and the need for sustainable development. However, I must direct my brief comments to three areas in which, if we are not careful, its objectives could be undermined. I very much hope that they will not be, but we must be alert to such matters.

First, I want to deal with the adequacy of the total spend. I absolutely endorse the comments of the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry). He made a somewhat diplomatic criticism of his Front Benchers and stressed the need to focus on the 0.7 per cent. target, which was set by the United Nations Assembly back in 1970. It was that we would achieve a 0.7 per cent. of GNP rate of spend on aid by the middle of that decade. International progress since then has been lamentable, and in this country the percentage—I agree that we must focus on the percentage—of GNP that the Conservative Government spent on development assistance between 1979 and 1997 halved.

Since then, there has been an improvement, but even at the rate of improvement that we have seen, it would take us 30 to 40 years to achieve the 0.7 per cent. target. I would like the Minister to give some indication of the timescale that he envisages; I would suggest 10 years to achieve that target. I would also like to hear Conservative Front-Bench Members make a recommitment to the target because, listening to them tonight, I was concerned that they might have abandoned any drive towards a 0.7 per cent. target and that the total cash spend by a particular country was more important.

It seems self-evident that 0.7 per cent. for Luxembourg or the UK is less than 0.7 per cent. for the United States, which is the world's largest economy. We are talking about the same size slice of cake, irrespective of the size of the cake.

Thus the first issue is the adequacy of the spend. It is essential that the international community achieve a more equitable sharing out of the world's resources, not solely because it is a moral imperative but because it is in our collective interest to do so. The hon. Member for Banbury was again correct in saying that it is incumbent on us all to convince others that other objectives depend on our eradicating poverty. We live in a highly interdependent world, and we cannot have peace and security in our own land in a world full of trouble. We must build peace and security across the globe, and we cannot achieve that if extremists can prey on desperation caused by poverty.

The second issue that I wanted to deal with was that of consistency of Government policy. I refer in particular to the case of the Tanzanian air traffic control system. That country spent £28 million on a system which the World Bank says is redundant and inappropriate. The World Bank reckons that Tanzania could buy an appropriate system for about £7 million. Tanzania has eight military aircraft—

Alan Haselhurst (Deputy Speaker, Saffron Walden)

Order. The hon. Gentleman may see the link between what he is saying and the Bill, but it is not yet evident to the House. On Third Reading of a Bill, his remarks must be within the context of that Bill.

Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat, North Norfolk)

I appreciate that, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The point that I am making is that there must be consistency across Departments. At the time of the sale to Tanzania, there was talk of the possibility of amending the export control legislation to achieve the same test of sustainable development and reduction of poverty that is at the core of this Bill. Will the Minister confirm that that will happen so that we have consistency across Departments, driving at the same objective of poverty reduction?

The third issue concerns the fact that 25 per cent. of the Department's aid expenditure is channelled through the EU. There is genuine concern that the EU is not yet performing as it should in channelling its aid into the reduction of poverty. All the trends have been in the wrong direction. A Library research paper says that in 1970–74 30 of the top recipients of EU aid were Africa-Caribbean-Pacific region countries, but by 1996–97 only two of them were in the top 15. That is a move entirely in the wrong direction. In 1970–74, two of the top 15 recipients were the Asian countries India and Bangladesh, but their position slipped, and by 1997–98 there were no Asian recipient countries in the top 15.

It is incumbent on the Government to ensure that their total spend on development assistance goes into the reduction of poverty and sustainable development. In an earlier intervention, I expressed concern that monitoring of the EU's aid budget had not started particularly auspiciously. The annual reports that were promised in 2000 have not yet appeared. The Government must demand change in the EU so as to ensure that the money spent on aid through the EU satisfies the same test as the Bill lays down for the rest of our aid.

The Bill is an excellent start in directing our spending in the right direction, but it is not enough on its own. There must also be an increase of resources going to the developing world. We must aim to achieve the 0.7 per cent. target within 10 years. There must be consistency across Departments, and we must ensure that all our aid meets that test.

Andrew Rosindell (Conservative, Romford)

I shall not detain the House for too long, as we have covered an enormous amount today and in previous stages of the Bill. It has been an education for me, as a new Member of Parliament. The Standing Committee was the first on which I have served, and it has been impressive to observe the passage of the Bill through Parliament. The consensus that we have reached in the House is a rarity.

The issue of overseas development and poverty reduction should unite all hon. Members, from whatever side of the House, because in this country we are privileged to be in a society in which poverty does not affect too many people. Of course we have poverty in some areas, but deprivation exists in countries across the world, where people are in genuine need and do not have the advantages that we take for granted. All hon. Members should work together to ensure that we get the best results for poor people in the third world who need help from countries such as the United Kingdom.

The administration of overseas aid must be efficient. We must be sure that the money we spend in this area is used to best effect. We must ensure that it is monitored. It is disappointing that the proposal of an annual report has not been accepted. It is also disappointing that once again we are using the European Union as a method of distributing overseas aid. The EU's record in that area is not particularly proud. I shall not give further examples, as some have already been given, and the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb) referred to the problem a few moments ago.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) said, there is nothing wrong with the idea of third party organisations distributing money, but we want to see that it is being used properly and not going to the wrong areas, and we do not want to see the huge delays caused by its being administered from Brussels.

A small point which, as the Minister knows, I have raised at earlier stages relates to the inclusion of the British overseas territories. I believe that, being British, they should be included in other legislation; they should not be lumped together and treated as if they were foreign territories in relation to international aid.

I am delighted to note that the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge) agrees with me. Sadly, as she will know, that is one of only a few matters on which we agree. The views that she expressed earlier on the United States concerned me greatly. The United States does a phenomenal amount of work in defending freedom, helping impoverished countries and assisting countries that lack democracy and are threatened by various interests. It is always the first nation to help bring about democracy, freedom and the alleviation of poverty, and we must stand by it.

I do not think that the debate is assisted by attacks on our ally, the United States. I believe that we need to work with the United States, and with all countries that want to contribute to the eradication of global poverty. Sidelining and criticising the United States does not help us to achieve our ultimate objective.

Nick Hawkins (Conservative, Surrey Heath)

With one exception, contributions to the debate have been of high quality. There has been a good deal of common ground between the parties. The Under–Secretary of State spoke briefly but skilfully, as always, about the overall concept of the Bill. He also stressed a fact that concerns hon. Members throughout the House: at the beginning of a new century and a new millennium, some 800 million people still cannot read or write, and 113 million children can obtain no education.

My hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) expressed our reservations about the Bill, and listed the ways in which we feel that it could have been improved. She rightly paid tribute to the retiring permanent secretary Sir John Vereker, and described what she had seen of the resilience of Afghan aid workers during her recent visit to Pakistan. She spoke of the need to go on tackling global poverty, and emphasised that Conservative Members had wanted specific provision for funds for good-governance projects in the Bill.

My hon. Friend also pointed out that we felt the Government had fallen at the first hurdle recently, a point picked up by the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb). The hon. Member for Clydebank and Milngavie (Tony Worthington), speaking with great experience of the subject, echoed the tributes to Sir John Vereker. I was slightly concerned when at one stage he appeared to praise without reservation the so-called "everything but arms" initiative. I attended a number of meetings just before the end of the last Parliament where many other Labour Members—led by the hon. Member for Hackney, North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) and the former Chairman of the Select Committee, Bowen Wells, to whose work I pay tribute—were worried about some of the adverse effects of that initiative, especially its impact in the Caribbean and knock-on results in the United Kingdom.

The hon. Member for Wimbledon (Roger Casale) spoke about his strong commitment to the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry), from his great experience as the current Chairman of the Select Committee, spoke of his worries about the collapse of civil society and the grim parts of the world, and expressed his views on the vexed question of percentages.

The hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr. Thomas) spoke about his support for the Brundtland definition of sustainable development, and praised the underlying spirit of some of the Conservative amendments that my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden moved in Committee, and some of the new clauses that were tabled for tonight's debate.

The hon. Member for City of York (Hugh Bayley) claimed credit for the focus on poverty concept, and said that he was delighted that it had moved from something that he put forward as a Back Bencher in his first Parliament to being part of the Bill. The hon. Member for North Norfolk went back to the question of percentages. Although he said that the percentage was moving in the right direction, he will not have forgotten that for the first three years under the present Government, it went down. He talked about the export guarantee amendment. He may have forgotten that that was a Conservative amendment.

My hon. Friend the Member for Romford (Mr. Rosindell) rightly defended the United States' role in protecting freedom and democracy, not least in aid. He expressed his concerns, which I share, about the delivery of aid, and about the way in which British overseas territories such as Gibraltar, on which he and I have great concerns, particularly at the moment, should be included properly in future legislation.

It has been a good-natured Third Reading debate, with one exception, as I said. I cannot finish without drawing attention to the fact that the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge), who contradicted the Liberal Democrat spokesman on foreign affairs in the debate on Zimbabwe, was comprehensively demolished by my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury.

The hon. Lady said a couple of things with which I agreed. She described herself as a difficult Liberal Democrat who needed a lot of tutoring. She said that she dreams about sustainable development, and that she needed a lot of education from the retiring permanent secretary and his civil servants about humanitarian issues. She wished my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury well in his difficult work chairing the Select Committee, but venting her anti-American spleen and prejudice was not worthy of her, her party or this debate.

Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central)

With the leave of the House, I would like to respond to the debate.

I thank all hon. Members for their contributions on Report, on Third Reading, in Committee and on Second Reading, and Members who were in the House when the Bill was considered last year for their involvement. I take this opportunity to thank officials from the Department for International Development and other Government Departments, without whom we would not be sitting here debating this Bill.

Hon. Members have kindly made favourable comments about the reputation of the Department. That is simply a reflection of the quality of the people who work in it. We are extremely fortunate. As a still relatively new Minister, I have been universally impressed by the quality, commitment and passion of the staff whom I have met during my time at the Department.

I have one regret about this evening's debate: my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Development is not able to be with us because of her presence in Tokyo for the Afghanistan reconstruction conference. No one has done more to bring the Bill about than her. No one is better qualified by her record, commitment and passion to take forward its principles. I am sure that the whole House wishes her well in that task.

I shall respond briefly to some of the specific points raised in the debate. The hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) has made that task a lot easier with his usual brilliant and succinct summing up of the contributions that we heard.

The question of EU aid was covered in the very good discussion on new clause 3. I shall not repeat what was said, but we reached a measure of consensus about what the Government are trying to achieve.

The question of the 0.7 per cent. target was raised by the hon. Members for Banbury (Tony Baldry), for Ceredigion (Mr. Thomas) and for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb), among others. As I and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State have said, the question is good and pertinent, and the House will not be entirely surprised that, on this happy occasion, I am fortunately not able to give an answer about the timetable. However, that is a debate that we need to have, and I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor will listen with interest to the points that have been made.

The hon. Members for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge), for Ceredigion and for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman) spoke about export control. Sustainable development is now an equal criterion among others, and the fact that we even have a debate about how to interpret that in relation to particular decisions shows how far we have moved. Twenty-five years ago, it would not have occurred to Members of Parliament to debate the merits of sustainable development—as opposed to Britain's interests—as a consideration in deciding such matters. The fact that the House is united in opposition to the concept of tied aid is a recognition of the shift that has take place over a generation.

On reconstruction, Afghanistan is the test of the moment, and the hon. Member for Meriden was right to draw attention to it. The money that we have committed this week is an expression of our commitment to that country's reconstruction, and shows clearly that the international community meant the promise that it made to the people of Afghanistan that it would not walk away from them, given all the pain and suffering that they had experienced. That point was ably supported by the contributions from my hon. Friend the Members for Clydebank and Milngavie (Tony Worthington), for Wimbledon (Roger Casale) and for City of York (Hugh Bayley). The latter told the House about his previous efforts to get some of the principles contained in the Bill on the statute book.

The House united on four matters on Third Reading. It united in sending its best wishes to Sir John Vereker, in expressing its commitment to the reduction of poverty, in recognising the influence that events in Afghanistan have had on our awareness of why it is more necessary now than ever to act to reduce poverty, and in supporting the Bill.

My hon. Friend the Member for City of York said that, in the end, the Bill was just a means to an end, and he was right. It is what we do with the Bill that matters. We now have a rare and real opportunity to make a difference. It is the responsibility of each and every one of us to make sure that we take it.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed, with an amendment.