Violence against Women and Girls (Sustainable Development Goals)

Lady Hermon Excerpts

Wednesday 27th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mark Durkan]

I fully accept what the hon. Lady has said. Again, that raises the question of our long-term commitment. It is great that we are able to celebrate the sustainable development goals, but we have to plan for what will be achieved by them. Making commitments is important, but making the commitments work well and developing them and growing them is even more important, and that is what we need to do.

I want to acknowledge the briefings that we have received; I hope that other hon. Members will be able to do more justice to them than I can in the time that I want to take—and the time I do not want to take—in this opening speech. We have received an important contribution from UNICEF, which has done so much in terms of the sustainable development goals and on the whole question of violence in all its forms as it affects children, particularly girls. I say that as a parliamentary champion of UNICEF.

We have also had important briefings from Christian Aid and Amnesty International. I hope other hon. Members will be able to take up some of the asks suggested in those briefings to ask the Minister about how DFID will pursue these goals alongside the others. Similarly, we have a useful contribution from the Bond SDG group, which raises the question of the parliamentary commitment to oversight of the goals, rather than simply the governmental commitment.

I told the hon. Member for Congleton that I had a country-specific issue of my own to raise as the chair of the all-party group on Sudan and South Sudan.

[Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)]

Before the hon. Gentleman moves on to Sudan, may I take him across the world to Afghanistan? British troops made an enormous sacrifice in terms of lives lost in Afghanistan, but they also made a tremendous contribution to rebuilding schools for girls and women teachers to avoid the violence that had been meted out to them by the Taliban and others. Is the hon. Gentleman able to update us on the status of women and girls in terms of education in Afghanistan post the withdrawal of British troops?

[Mark Durkan]

I am not in a position to speak authoritatively on that, but I am sure the Minister will be able to answer those points. The hon. Member for North Down has drawn attention to the issue of education and schools, an issue that the all-party group on protecting children in armed conflict, which existed in the previous Parliament, addressed. In the context of conflict and humanitarian crises, education was not always to the forefront in the immediate interventions that were planned, and DFID acknowledged that it was not so much a lower order but a later order consideration in its response to crisis and emergencies.

The points in the report, which were well supported by the charity War Child when the APPG was chaired by Fiona O’Donnell, are being taken forward now in the APPG on global education for all, working with the Global Campaign for Education. The urgency of delivering children’s right to education during crisis is highlighted in the report, “Education cannot wait”. One of the points emphasised is that education investment in schools in conflict and post-conflict situations is good because it helps to save boys from falling prey to being recruited as child soldiers and then being corrupted into engagement in violence against women and girls. It also gives girls the opportunity of education and the transformative empowerment that that gives them.