Should we spend £14.6 billion a year on foreign aid?
I HAVE first-hand experience of the wastefulness of the UK’s £14.6billion foreign aid budget. While deployed in Somalia on a UN/African Union mission, the Department for International Development (DfID) invested in a runway that was not long enough for the UN to use with fully laden aircraft. DfID funded the building of barracks for the Somalia National Army, which they were advised were unlikely to be used because this is not part of their culture. No one seemed to care what effect the projects had: it seemed to be more important to just get the money spent. We could do much better with less funding and better targeted projects.
LISA WILDE, Portsmouth, Hants.
BORIS Johnson is under pressure over foreign aid to China and India. I totally agree that it should be stopped – for all countries. It’s bad enough that the UK is in such a bad state. Since we in Scotland pay our taxes to the governments of both the United Kingdom and Scotland, does that mean we are paying twice as much? All proposals to give aid should be voted on by the public in the same way as an election. have a list every year or so with the proposed countries listed and let the people put an ‘X’ where they want their money to go.
NAME AND ADDRESS SUPPLIED
BRITISH foreign aid spending is not a farce, but something to be proud of. UK aid supported the immunisation of more than 56 million children between January 2015 and December 2016. And the pledge of £1.4 billion to the global fund to fight HIV, tuberculosis and malaria will save two million lives over three years. I agree that aid should go to the people most in need. That’s why Boris Johnson shouldn’t merge DFID into the Foreign
Office. Doing so would risk diverting priorities away from alleviating poverty. Tackling extreme poverty is in all our interests as it will lead to a healthier and less conflict-prone world. The United Kingdom’s aid spending is not big: it represents less than a penny in a pound of our income.
KAREN DOWNARD, Macclesfield, Cheshire.
HOW much of our bloated foreign aid, much of which is wasted, is the Government using to help Australia?
J. COLVIN, Ruislip, Middlesex.
IT IS ridiculous that the NHS and other public services are in crisis while our money is spent on worthless causes abroad. We are generous givers when there is a disaster, but as taxpayers we should have a say about what this £14.6 billion is spent on.
VALERIE GIBSON, address supplied.