Oral Answers to Questions

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the International Development Committee.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

It is not just Afghanistan where we see a rollback in the protection of women and girls. Last week, I was in Sierra Leone, working with parliamentarians there to try to prevent sexual-based violence. As part of that trip, we went to the maternal health unit in Freetown, where the UK has been supporting the health industry for the last 20 years. We cut all of our funding to that last year, which means there is now no money for procurement or for any healthcare in that country. What are we going to do for countries where we have cut all our funding to help them transition in a meaningful way, rather than presenting them, basically, with a death sentence?

[Stephen Doughty]

The Chair of the Select Committee is a long-standing champion on these issues, even before her time chairing the Committee, and she and I have discussed these issues on many occasions. We always welcome a conversation with her about these matters, and I am sure that the Minister for International Development, who has responsibility for Africa, and indeed the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Chris Elmore), who works on preventing sexual violence, would be happy to sit down and discuss these issues with her.