£500m of foreign aid cash given to scandal-hit firm
ALMOST half a billion pounds in taxpayers’ cash has been handed to a controversial foreign aid consultancy facing claims it made excessive profits, a report reveals.
Adam Smith International (ASI), involved in projects such as the privatisation of Nigeria’s electricity supply, was handed £103million last year alone.
In total it has received £462million in the past five years, says the report from the Independent Commission for Aid Impact.
The watchdog’s revelation comes as readers flock to back our Stop The Foreign Aid Madness crusade.
ASI has defended its activities as having been in “good faith”.
But the report found that the firm has pulled out of the bidding process for new contracts following growing pressure over its operations.
The Department for International Development (DfID) has 21 live contracts with ASI but has not signed any new deals or extended existing agreements since December last year.
Abuses
The consultancy faces allegations it falsified submissions to a committee of MPs and made use of improperly obtained government documents for commercial gain.
The watchdog found that DfID has been slow to exercise new accounting methods.
And it said the complex and lengthy nature of aid programmes could “lead to an imbalance of information” between DfID and its suppliers, particularly larger organisations involved in previous contracts.
“Such firms have advantages over new entrants and the potential to use their market power to increase their profits,” it added.
Watchdog chief commissioner Dr Alison Evans, said: “Ensuring that a wide range of suppliers is able to bid and compete for DfID contracts is important to ensure that UK aid programmes have access to specialist skills at the best possible price.”
The scale of the UK aid budget has provoked an outcry.
John O’Connell, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “It is CRUSADE well known that having a fixed amount to spend will lead to widespread abuses of the system.
“Large companies with departments dedicated to winning government contracts will always be able to grab taxpayers’ cash if the department is more focused on getting money out the door than measuring the good it can do.
“The Government needs to scrap the 0.7 per cent aid target and massively rein in the wasteful spending.”
The Daily Express crusade calls for our underfunded health service, creaking social care system and elderly services to be prioritised over international aid.
More than 75,000 readers have signed in support and a petition has begun on the Downing Street website which will lead to a Commons debate if it achieves 100,000 responses.
To back the Express crusade go online to petition.parliament.uk/ petitions/200292