END OF THE CASH POINT IN THE SKY
Boris scraps foreign aid department that gave away £15bn last year
BORIS Johnson axed Britain’s bloated foreign aid department last night after warning it had come to be seen as a ‘giant cashpoint in the sky’.
In a break with two decades of cross-party orthodoxy, he said the Department for International Development (Dfid) would be made the junior partner in a new ‘super department’ led by the Foreign Office.
the move – a victory for a long-running Daily Mail campaign – prompted a backlash from architects of the old system, including David Cameron and tony Blair.
Mr Johnson said the controversial commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of the UK’s national income on foreign aid will remain in place.
however, Government sources confirmed the aid budget would ‘shrink sharply’ this year in line with the economy. A 20 per cent fall in GDP could see overseas aid slashed by about £3billion. the PM said the merger would provide more ‘mega wattage’ for Britain’s priorities overseas. And he was scathing about the record of Dfid, which critics have long warned is divorced from the UK’s wider foreign policy agenda.
he told MPs: ‘For too long, frankly, the UK’s aid budget has been treated as some giant cashpoint in the sky, without any reference to UK interests, or to the values that the UK wishes to express.’ he suggested that Dfid’s spending sometimes even undermined Britain’s diplomatic efforts.
‘It’s no use a British diplomat going into see the leader of a country and urging him not to cut the head off his opponent, and to do something for democracy in his country if the next day another emanation of this government is going to arrive with a cheque for £250million,’ he said.
Under the new arrangements, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab will take charge of decisions on aid policy as head of a new combined department called the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
Current aid secretary Anne-Marie trevelyan will continue in her role until the merger is completed in September. the PM hinted that the Department for International trade led by Liz truss could also be taken into the Foreign Office eventually as part of a bid to promote ‘Global Britain’ after Brexit.
And he suggested that the new set up could result in some aid money being spent on political priorities in eastern europe rather than humanitarian projects in Africa, adding: ‘We give as much aid to Zambia as we do to Ukraine, although the latter is vital for european security, and we give ten times as much aid to tanzania as we do to the six countries of the western Balkans, which are acutely vulnerable to Russian meddling.’
Mr Cameron branded the decision ‘a mistake’.
the former PM, who believed aid spending could help ‘detoxify’ the tory brand, said: ‘More could and should be done to co-ordinate aid and foreign policy, including through the National Security Council, but the end of Dfid will mean less expertise, less voice for development at the top table and ultimately less respect for the UK overseas.’
Mr Blair, who created Dfid in 1997, said he was ‘utterly dismayed’ by the decision, which he described as ‘wrong and regressive’.
Former tory aid secretary Andrew Mitchell said abolishing Dfid was ‘a quite extraordinary mistake’ which would ‘destroy one of the most effective and respected engines of international development anywhere in the world’.
Charities also condemned the move. Patrick Watt, policy director at Christian Aid, said: ‘today’s announcement is an act of political vandalism.’
Aid spending surged to £14.6billion last year – more than four times the Foreign Office budget.
the Prime Minister said taxpayers had the right to expect value for money, and said the coronavirus pandemic had shown that ‘distinctions between diplomacy and overseas development are artificial and outdated’.
IF fresh evidence were needed that Britain is teetering on the brink of a catastrophic recession, it arrived yesterday in spades.
During lockdown, more than 600,000 people have been made unemployed. Those claiming jobless benefits soared by a haircurling 1.6million.
And this is just the start of the nightmare. As the Government’s business bailouts are rolled back, the Covid- crippled country must brace for a tsunami of job losses.
But lulled by furlough and the sun, the public seem to be in denial – like sunbathers blissfully unaware of a storm approaching.
Millions have worked tirelessly through the lockdown. But too many don’t want it to end – or believe they will be no worse off afterwards. That is a suicidal delusion.
So it is time for Boris Johnson to strive to save viable businesses by shaking us out of this debilitating and morbid funk.
First, he must scrap the over-zealous twometre social distancing rule, which has frozen the lucrative hospitality sector.
Next, the ludicrous policy of quarantining travellers arriving in Britain should be abandoned. Then, he needs to devise imaginative policies to save the high street and turbocharge tourism.
Yet, there is good news. Covid deaths are plunging. And UK scientists have found a £5 drug that fights coronavirus – the biggest breakthrough since the crisis began.
The Prime Minister must take us forward. Social tension and inequality is racking the country. If the UK is still trapped in amber when the economic pain hits, that simmering anger could bubble over.