Raab to resist plans to pay for Covid by cutting foreign aid

DOMINIC RAAB is preparing to go head-to-head with Treasury officials who plan to cut the UK’S foreign aid budget to pay for the cost of Covid-19, The Daily Telegraph has learnt.

Mr Raab, the Foreign Secretary, officially takes over the UK’S international development brief tomorrow, following the Government’s merger of the Foreign Office and the Department for

International Development. He is expected to push back against leaked plans to abandon the UK’S legal commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of gross national income on international aid, thought to be under consideration by Treasury officials.

Mr Raab will reaffirm the Government’s commitment to the 0.7 per cent figure, which is also a Conservative manifesto pledge, sources said.

“Whoever is suggesting this doesn’t know the mind of the Foreign Secretary,” a senior Whitehall source added.

The suggestion that aid could be axed is thought to have come from Treasury civil servants, rather than from Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor, a government source suggested.

Foreign Office officials are confident the Chancellor will not support the plans on Budget day in November.

Boris Johnson is thought to be against any changes to the aid spend, but the proposed cut is one of a number of measures floated in recent days that suggest the Treasury is planning a major fundraising Budget in November. A rise in corporation tax and a raid on pensions have also been suggested as ways to reduce the large budget deficit left after the Government’s emergency coronavirus measures.

The annual aid spending target is set out in law, and could only be undone by a vote in Parliament.