Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, pursuant to Answer of 27 April 2020 to Question 37585 on World Health Organisation: Overseas Aid, what reforms to the World Health Organisation her Department is seeking as a result of that agency's response to the covid-19 pandemic.
Answered by Wendy Morton
DFID expects WHO’s Health Emergencies Programme (WHE), established in 2016, to continuously improve and develop its critical work.
As an example, in our annual reviews of performance, we have noted the need for WHE to continue to develop its capabilities around human resources – to ensure it can get the right people, in the right place at the right time.
Any review of WHE’s should come after the world has successfully addressed the COVID-19 pandemic and should consider the whole global response across countries and the international system, as well as WHO. The UK will engage on any review with a detailed position when this is forthcoming.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what information her Department holds on how the World Health Organisation plans to spend funding granted to that organisation by the UK Government in the next 12 months.
Answered by Wendy Morton
The Government provides funding to the World Health Organisation (WHO) through a number of specific health programmes and through core funding. In the next 12 months, our core funding will support WHO deliver its 13th General Programme of Work that seeks to protect 1 billion people from health emergencies, provide 1 billion more people with access to universal health coverage, and enable 1 billion more people to live healthier lives. Our health programme support addresses specific UK priorities within the 13th General Programme of Work, for example, health systems strengthening, global health security and work to end the preventable deaths of mothers, children and new-borns.
The UK is the second largest Member State funder to WHO overall; this amount varies year upon year based on need – this was around 10% of WHO’s income over the last two years. The UK’s contribution to WHO for COVID-19 response is world-leading and will likely significantly increase UK’s share.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what recent discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for International Trade on improving bilateral trade with developing countries.
Answered by Andrew Murrison
The Department for International Development and the Department for International Trade are working together to ensure development and global prosperity are at the heart of UK trade and investment policy.
Once we leave the EU, the UK will be able to offer an integrated trade and development package, encompassing preferential trade arrangements for developing countries and aid that facilitates trade and promotes investment.
At the UK-Africa Investment Summit, we announced plans to establish an import promotion service, Trade Connect, to help developing countries make the most of preferential trade access to the UK, and increase their presence in international markets. We also announced an extension to our SheTrades Commonwealth programme so that it can continue to help female entrepreneurs to access trading opportunities.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps his Department is taking to help strengthen tax systems of developing countries.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
The UK is committed to supporting countries to achieve the Global Goals, including working actively with countries to help raise and manage public revenues, and thereby to invest in their public services and infrastructure.
In February 2019 we announced a new £47 million package of support to assist developing countries in strengthening their tax systems. This package will provide technical assistance and capacity building support through a number of partners. It will also help contribute to economic growth by helping to tackle tax avoidance and evasion, and by creating a more level playing field for businesses. In addition to this new package of support, the UK has a number of other initiatives underway to help strengthen tax systems; in August 2018 DFID Ethiopia launched a £35 million programme to support the Ethiopian government in transforming the country’s tax system, and HMRC’s Capacity Building Unit provides peer-to-peer expertise to raise the standards of tax systems of developing countries.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps her Department is taking to ensure other international donors contribute to funding education programmes.
Answered by Harriett Baldwin - Shadow Minister (Development)
The UK is committed to promoting more and better spending on education to help ensure that all children, including the most marginalised, are in school and learning.
To maximise our impact and ensure that collectively we are scaling up to meet the enormous need, we work closely with other international actors, the private sector and non-traditional donors in all our major education investments, including through the Global Partnership for Education and Education Cannot Wait funds.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what measures she is taking to ensure that the most marginalised children receive an education.
Answered by Harriett Baldwin - Shadow Minister (Development)
Every child deserves a quality education, and the most marginalised children are at the heart of the UK’s commitment to Sustainable Development Goal 4. DFID’s flagship Girls’ Education Challenge is supporting up to 1.5 million disadvantaged girls to get a quality education. We are global leaders in providing education in emergencies and founder of the Inclusive Education Initiative for children with disabilities.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, pursuant to the Answer of 18 September 2018 to Question 173559 on Caribbean: Hurricanes and Tornadoes, what proportion of that £196 million spent in September 2017 on Caribbean hurricane relief was used to support British Overseas Territories.
Answered by Harriett Baldwin - Shadow Minister (Development)
£72m was committed to help the Overseas Territories. This funding delivered the UK Government’s immediate response and support for early recovery priorities in the three affected territories of Anguilla, British Virgin Islands and Turks and Caicos Islands. Further to this, the Prime Minister committed a further £70m for reconstruction efforts and up to £300m of UK Government loan guarantees.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps she is taking to ensure that the (a) Caribbean British Overseas Territories and (b) Commonwealth Caribbean islands are prepared for hurricane season.
Answered by Alistair Burt
The UK provided over £196m in response to the devastating hurricanes in September 2017 in the Caribbean. In preparation for this year’s hurricane season, the Department for International Development (DFID), the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Ministry of Defence have coordinated response plans to support British Overseas Territories and independent Commonwealth countries in the Caribbean. RFA Mounts Bay is in the region with helicopter airlift capacity and stocks of humanitarian relief items. UK supplies have also been pre-positioned on the island of Antigua. In addition the Secretary of State for International Development has instructed the department to ensure that any response to the impact of hurricanes in the British Overseas Territories and independent Commonwealth countries in the Caribbean will have a priority call on our reserves.
DFID is providing expertise to the Caribbean Disaster and Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) and national disaster offices in our partner countries. DFID also supported establishment of a multinational response coordination centre within CDEMA. In the longer term, the UK is investing over £360m in disaster resilient infrastructure across the Caribbean.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps her Department is taking to secure preferential trading access to the UK for least developed countries after the UK leaves the EU.
Answered by Alistair Burt
As we set out in the trade White Paper, ‘Preparing for our future trade policy’, published on 9 October, we will introduce legislation so the UK is ready to put in place a trade preferences scheme as we leave the EU. This will, as a minimum, provide the same level of access as the current EU trade preference scheme. It means that around 48 least developed countries across the globe will continue to benefit from duty-free exports into the UK on all goods, other than arms and ammunition.
Asked by: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)
Question to the Department for International Development:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps her Department is taking to promote economic development in developing countries.
Answered by Priti Patel
The way to end poverty and aid dependency is through inclusive economic growth, jobs, investment and trade. I recently launched DFID’s Economic Development Strategy which sets out my Department’s commitment to this agenda and the steps we are taking to deliver our priorities. Stronger economic development will enable the poorest countries to stand on their own two feet and is firmly in the UK’s national interest.