Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the potential effect on family planning and sexual and reproductive health and rights programmes of the planned reduction in UK ODA spending from 0.7 per cent to 0.5 per cent of GNI.

The UK is proud to champion comprehensive sexual and reproductive health and rights, including family planning; these are fundamental to the empowerment of girls and women. Advancing gender equality and women's rights are a core part of the UK Government's work on development, including enabling girls to fulfil 12 years of quality education.

The Foreign Secretary has completed the cross-government review of how Official Development Assistance (ODA) will be allocated against the government's priorities for 2021. The aim is to ensure UK ODA is focused on strategic priorities, where it will have the maximum impact, enable greater coherence and deliver the most value for money. Officials are now working through the implications of these allocations. No decisions on individual sectoral budgets have been taken yet by Ministers.