Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what policies and programmes her Department has to tackle female genital mutilation and early forced marriage; and what progress has been made in this area following the Prime Minister's Girl Summit held in July 2014.

The UK is the biggest international donor to efforts tackling female genital mutilation, investing up to £35 million over 5 years. This funding enables three strands of work. First, work directly within local communities and governments to back action to end FGM in 15 countries. Secondly, research into the most cost-effective approaches to ending FGM, to make sure our work has the maximum impact, and thirdly social change communications and support to UK based diaspora groups for efforts to end the practice in their countries of origin.

At Girl Summit 2014, the Secretary of State for International Development announced a new commitment of up to £25 million for a UN multi-country programme to end child, early and forced marriage in 12 countries, and an investment of £31 million to generate new evidence on what works to transform lives of poor adolescent girls. DFID is also exploring new mechanisms to support civil society addressing FGM and CEFM.

DFID is driving forward its work on both of these important agendas. In parallel, we are building on the achievements of the Girl Summit, which included support from over 450 governments, organisations and individuals for a Charter that called to an end to FGM and CEFM, 12,000 social media pledges for this cause, and over 130 policy commitments contributing towards this objective. DFID is working to maintain this international momentum by calling for more signatories to the charter, delivery of the commitments that were made and further action to end these practices.