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When I was in the Foreign Office, an unofficial principle was to avoid any initiative which could be spun negatively by the Daily Mail, which has waged a decades-long campaign against “wasteful” British aid expenditure.
Examples cited by the Mail include the vast amounts of development aid given to India, a country which has its own space programme and nuclear arsenal; to authoritarian or corrupt regimes in Africa; to places where the per capita GDP is higher than in some parts of the UK; to aid organisations allegedly associated with terrorists; or to projects advancing “politically correct” goals – such as eco-hammams in Morocco, ‘friendship benches’ in Zimbabwe and anti-smoking lessons in Pakistan.
The Daily Mail regularly argues that the money would be better spent supporting needy communities in the UK.
Not all the Daily Mail’s criticisms are unwarranted. When I was Head of the Human Rights Department in the Foreign Office, I used to argue frequently with my DFID counterparts about their focus on poverty as the prime metric for deciding where to allocate UK aid – because it often resulted in aid being poured into countries where the main reason poverty was high was due to government corruption and incompetence. I witnessed this firsthand when I was Political Counselor in New Delhi in the mid-2000s, when huge amounts of UK aid went to Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, then two of the worst-run states in India.
DFID staff at the time also adopted the lofty attitude that they would not allow “grubby” political considerations to influence their aid decisions. In practice, this meant countries with dreadful human rights records could still receive UK aid, if poverty levels in places there were below a certain threshold. Even worse, to avoid appearing “colonial” or patronizing, DFID insisted that aid should only be allocated in partnership with the government of the receiving country. This meant that corrupt and abusive regimes could influence where and how UK aid was spent. DFID used to regularly celebrate China, Ethiopia and Rwanda’s achievements in lifting people out of poverty, even though all three countries were regularly singled out for criticism in the Foreign Office’s annual human rights reports.
While incompetent or repressive regimes were thus rewarded by DFID, countries which were beginning to emerge from poverty as a result of better, more accountable, government, often found themselves cut off from further aid, once they reached middle-income status.
Even Rory Stewart, a former Minister for International Development, has admitted that much UK aid was “wasteful and paternalistic.”
However, just as Brexit backers used to mischaracterize a lot of EU activity – for example, lampooning EU regulations supposedly banning “bendy bananas”, so much Daily Mail criticism of DFID was misguided and pernicious, focusing on weaknesses, and ignoring successes. As DFID closed its doors in 2020 to merge with the FCO, a list of its achievements included reaching tens of millions of people with humanitarian assistance, advancing girl’s education, improving maternal health, helping to eradicate polio, combating landmines, supporting victims of sexual violence, and advancing the UN Millennium goals.
Projects administered by the Foreign Office are far smaller in scale and expense, and often directed with explicit political aim in mind – for example, to advance human rights or democracy, to strengthen the rule of law, promote security, or combat disinformation. Because of this sensitive political context, this means projects are often done in partnership with civil society or through non-governmental organisations. It also means they are often given innocuous-sounding titles, to avoid attracting negative attention from hostile authorities. So, the Foreign Office might appear to be supporting, say, “a youth media workshop” or a project to build cycle lanes – easy targets for Daily Mail criticism. But, the true purpose might be to develop political advocacy skills, or promote networking between different civic groups, trying to work in a repressive environment.
The DFID merger with the FCO in 2020 has had mixed results. According to an assessment by the National Audit Office last year, it has produced no evident savings in money, reduced development capability, and badly damaged staff morale – as I have also heard anecdotally from former colleagues in the service. The main positive has been to facilitate a more integrated approach to development and diplomacy, resulting in a more coherent overall UK government position.
I remain sceptical that staff from two organisations with such widely differing ethoses can ever be fully successfully merged together. There will always be tensions between the FCO’s more political focus, and the poverty reduction and sustainable development goals of the former DFID. However, there have been notable successes – for example, the extraordinary amount of UK aid to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in early 2022. This has played a vital role in bolstering Ukrainian resilience, and has recently been entrenched by the launch of a landmark “100 Year Partnership” between the two countries, spanning military and non-military areas.
When well directed, aid opens doors and builds valuable partnerships with countries around the world. It enhances our security by strengthening our military alliances, bolstering the resilience of countries against aggressors, and mitigating the effects of conflicts or other disruptive events, such as natural disasters. This prevents blowback in our own country, by helping affected persons stay in place, rather than migrating to seek refuge elsewhere. It advances national prosperity, by helping countries develop into stable trading and investment partners. It contributes to making the world overall a safer and better place to live, by promoting democratic and accountable government, respect for a rules-based international system, and better international collaboration on global challenges such as climate change, pandemics, organized crime, drug trafficking, terrorism and nuclear proliferation.
Overall, the UK has an aid record to be proud about.
Second only, perhaps, to that of the United States, which gives more aid globally than any other country – albeit, not the most generous on a per capita basis. That honour goes to Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden and Denmark. As I know from my own time working within State Department in the early 2000s, where I oversaw human rights grants in the Middle East, as well as from my recent role as a trustee on the board of a well-respected non-profit foundation promoting free societies in Europe and Asia, US aid is also aimed at very worthy goals, similar to that of the UK, explicitly linked to core US interests.
Global Betrayal
Donald Trump has now tossed this out of the window, by announcing an immediate freeze on all US foreign aid for 90 days, except emergency food aid, and military assistance to Israel and Egypt. No doubt the Daily Mail would find much to cheer in this decision. But amongst the projects which have ground to a halt are US counter-terrorism programmes in third countries; military financing programmes to Ukraine, Jordan and Taiwan; malaria and HIV programmes in Africa; support for refugees; all human rights and democracy activities, including support for activists fighting for their rights, or in some cases their lives, in authoritarian countries; and global initiatives to combat organized crime. It is not an exaggeration to say that millions of lives around the world will be damaged during this hiatus.
It is not just foreign aid partners who have been thrown into crisis. Across Washington, organisations which receive grants from USAID or State Department are scrambling to work out which programmes are affected, whether they can secure a waiver from the executive order, or will have to start cutting back projects and staff. Most of these organisations do not have a financial cushion which will protect them beyond 30 days.
Staff in USAID and State Department are in turmoil trying to field urgent questions from grantees, whilst simultaneously worrying about their own jobs. Over 50 senior USAID staff have already been put on administrative leave for alleged “resistance” to Trump. Many fear Trump’s ultimate intention is to close USAID altogether. Many programmes, especially on the military assistance side, take years to develop, and cannot easily be switched on and off on a whim, or are contracted out to private businesses, which may go under if the freeze isn’t lifted soon.
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The “stop work” order was issued by new US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, who upon his swearing-in last week declared that his guiding principle would be to uphold Trump’s pledge that “the priority of the United States Department of State will be the United States….and that everything we do must be justified by the answer to one of three questions: Does it make us stronger, does it make us safer, and does it make us more prosperous? If it doesn’t do one of those three things, we will not do it.”
The decision to freeze US aid does none of those things. In fact, quite the opposite. Following on from Trump’s earlier announcements to withdraw from the World Health Organization, and the Climate Paris Accord, this is another needlessly harmful, short-sighted, and deeply counter-productive action. As the US signals a further retreat from the world stage, waiting in the wings to take its place is China.
It is not unreasonable for a new administration to want to review major financial projects, to ensure they are consistent with its own policy priorities. However, it should not need to put all projects on hold, pending the outcome. Many new governments, including Keir Starmer’s in the UK last year, typically commission a strategic defence review when they come into office. But, they don’t stop all military and intelligence activity while the review is underway – which would obviously be absurd and self-defeating. The same logic applies to aid activity.
Moreover, under the US constitution, Congress has the power of the purse. Many of the projects which have been put on hold are ones which have been explicitly authorized by Congress, with money already appropriated. This is another area where Trump is trampling over America’s system of checks and balances. When will America’s cowed legislators finally begin to stand up for their rights?