UK demands rule change after hurricane help fiasco

BRITAIN will today press for a change in the rules that prevented overseas aid being used to help its overseas territories wrecked by Hurricane Irma last month.

International Development Secretary Priti Patel is in Paris for a meeting of the Development Assistance Committee, part of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Ms Patel told MPs last week of her determination to seek agreement to reform 40-year-old DAC rules on what qualifies as foreign aid and who is allowed to receive it. There was outrage last month when the current rules stopped the UK using any of its £13billion-a-year aid budget to repair hurricane damage in the British dependent islands of Anguilla, Turks and Caicos and the British Virgin Islands.

Their national income was deemed too high by World Bank criteria to qualify for official overseas aid.

Countries must have a gross national income of less than $12,235 (£9,320) per person to qualify for official aid.

Anguilla, and St Kitts and Nevis, were taken off the list in 2014, the British Virgin Islands in 2000 and the Turks and Caicos Islands were removed in 2008.

Ms Patel says she has had positive signals of support from OECD secretary-general Angel Gurria – but that Britain respects the need for consensus.

All 30 DAC members – including EU nations, America, Japan, Australia and Canada – must agree for reforms to take place. The committee will consider allowing “middle-income countries” – which had originally come off the list because they were deemed too rich – to re-register if they suffer an unexpected economic hit.

Another option is an “emergency waiver” under which a country could be allowed to receive overseas aid for a short period after a crisis.

But this is expected to be opposed by some DAC members who do not want to make a special case for British territories. Some also fear that funding for the islands could divert aid away from tackling long-term poverty in poorer countries.

The committee will publish its conclusions tomorrow, but sources said rule changes were unlikely to be made in a day.

Further issues to be explored are likely to include how to decide a country should be put back on the aid list, how to ensure that reform helps all countries and not just UK territories and how to protect resources for long-term poverty reduction.