Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to his Answer of 4 November 2021 to Question 67246 on International Monetary System, what estimate he has made of the monetary value of 0.5 per cent of Gross National Income in the remainder of this Parliament.

On 27 October the Office for Budget Responsibility published its Economic and Fiscal Outlook, which is accessible here: https://obr.uk/efo/economic-and-fiscal-outlook-october-2021/.

It forecasts cumulative Gross National Income (GNI) over the 2021 Spending Review period (the financial years 2022-23 to 2024-25) to be £7,606 billion in nominal terms. 0.5 per cent of this GNI estimate is £38 billion.

It forecasts cumulative GNI over the calendar years 2022 to 2024 to be £7,531 billion in nominal terms. 0.5% of this GNI estimate is £37.6 billion.

The UK reports ODA spending on a calendar year basis in our annual Statistics on International Development publication: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-on-international-development.

In July, the Chancellor set out the responsible fiscal circumstances under which we will return to spending 0.7% of GNI on ODA: when the independent Office for Budget Responsibility’s fiscal forecast confirms that, on a sustainable basis, the government is not borrowing for day-to-day spending and underlying debt is falling: https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-statements/detail/2021-07-12/hcws172.

Given the government’s careful stewardship of the public finances and the strength of the recovery, these fiscal tests are now forecast to be met in 2024-25. As such, the 2021 Spending Review provisionally sets aside additional unallocated ODA funding for 2024-25, on top of departmental ODA settlements, to the value of the difference between 0.5% and 0.7% of GNI.

The government will continue to monitor future forecasts closely and, each year over this period, will review and confirm, in accordance with the International Development (Official Development Assistance Target) Act 2015 Act, whether a return to spending 0.7% of GNI on ODA is possible against the latest fiscal forecast.