Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, with reference to the Minister for International Development’s letter of 14 March 2025 to the International Development Select Committee, how many (a) business cases, (b) contracts and (c) agreements for aid programmes were put on hold following the instruction issued to aid programmes.

As an immediate step to prepare for the reduction to the UK's Official Development Assistance (ODA) budget, the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) issued an instruction on 7 March to all ODA programme teams in FCDO not to approve new business cases, contracts or agreements, or announce new funding until initial allocations for FCDO ODA in the financial year 2025/26 are set. Payments under existing agreements has continued. In the Minister for Development's letter of Thursday 27 March to the International Development Committee, she confirmed FCDO's approach to setting initial ODA allocations for the financial year 2025/26, including the broad criteria against which new business cases, contracts and agreements will be considered through an exemption process. Given the ongoing exemption process, it is not possible to set out a total number of new business cases, contracts and agreements that FCDO ODA programme teams may have progressed but did not do so as a result of this approach. Guidance has been provided to teams to enable the ongoing development of business cases in high priority areas.