14
Examination of witnesses
Stephanie Draper and Simon Starling.
Q1 The Chair: Good morning. I welcome to this meeting of the International Relations and Defence Select Committee in the House of Lords Stephanie Draper, chief executive at Bond, the UK network for approximately 400 organisations large and small that are working in international development, and Simon Starling, director of policy and advocacy at Bond. Thank you for joining us today to give evidence for our session examining the impact of the merger of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office with the Department for International Development. It is an appropriate time to take a look at this matter because the FCDO, as it is now, is facing its greatest diplomatic challenges for decades as we see President Putin launch an illegal war against Ukraine, showering civilians and hospitals with indiscriminate bombing using missiles.
Our witnesses and committee members will of course have to ensure that we remember that this session is on the record, transcribed and broadcast as usual. I also remind members to declare any relevant interests before asking their questions today.
I will begin, as ever, by asking a question that is rather broad in scope, then turn to my colleagues for more detailed questions. I anticipate that throughout this session, which will last until 11 am, when my colleagues ask a question they may wish to ask a linked supplementary question.
The general question is: does the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office appear to have a different approach to the goals and delivery of overseas aid from the approach that DfID took? Are there examples of where foreign and security policy appears to have taken precedence over development priorities since the merger took place? Stephanie, may I start with you? I appreciate that your time is limited until 11 am, and then your colleague Simon will stay with us until 11.30 am.
Stephanie Draper: Thank you, and apologies that I could not be there with you in person. Does the FCDO appear to have a different approach to development from DfID? It does. The merger was explicitly intended to change our approach to overseas aid, aligning diplomacy with broader international activities and bringing those things together, as per the integrated review. Although we were not supportive of the merger at the time, it is an opportunity because achieving a sustainable future and a just and fair world requires all the international toolkit. But we have seen that development priorities seem to take a back seat when it comes to a number of immediate, more urgent, pressing priorities. You mentioned Ukraine as a good example of that.
We still do not have from the new department an international development strategy. That suggests to me that it is not at the heart of the new department. We are told that it is coming, but it has been a long time in fruition following the integrated review published in March 2021. That is a big gap for us.
We have also seen development priorities shrinking. We had seven priorities initially when the department was merged. The current Foreign Secretary states three current priorities: women and girls, humanitarian, and green infrastructure. That narrows the focus of international development, which is a core part of the system that the integrated review reflects. That is concerning to us, and we are waiting to see how the fuller international development strategy works.
In the integrated review we also did not see a very strong focus on development. We think that is a real missed opportunity, because development is really underutilised in connection with defence and diplomacy. It is about building the foundations of a safer and fairer world, and a lot of that is really cost effective. Prevention, be that conflict prevention or supporting states before they are in crisis, pre-fragility, is underserved in not bringing development further to the fore. There are lots of existing strategies within DfID, such as a commitment to 50% of our overseas development assistance going to fragile states and commitments to the SDGs and “leave no one behind”, which are much less to the fore. That 50% commitment has not been carried forward into the FCDO.
One exception that we are pleased to see is the FCDO disability inclusion and rights strategy, which was brought on board in February. That is great and has been welcomed by those working on disability rights. We have not seen how that translates into practice, but it is a good sign.
Overall, it is less to the fore. That focus on those central organising principles that give you a systemic view, such as the sustainable development goals and a poverty focus, has declined in the new department.
The Chair: Thank you. Mr Starling, do you wish to add anything to that?
Simon Starling: Yes. I will add just a couple of things. As Stephanie says and as you all know, international development is a long-term, complex challenge. Changing priorities on a regular basis is not that helpful, so we are waiting to see the international development strategy. We will review that and make a judgment on how things are looking then. In practice, what has happened is that quite a lot of very big decisions have been made before the strategy has come out, so the strategy is not driving the decisions. Rather, political choices are driving the decisions being made.
As you know, the merger was largely overshadowed by the cuts to the aid budget; about a third of the aid budget has gone. The NAO report that comes out tomorrow on the management of the aid cuts process will be interesting reading. The cut to the bilateral aid programme is huge; it is about half. That is the context in which we are waiting to see the new strategy. Obviously, decisions are having to be made in advance of that, and the decisions that we are seeing are largely a change from what we saw under DfID. Under DfID there was a very strong focus on the sustainable development goals and on leaving no one behind, reaching the furthest behind first. That poverty focus was really baked into DfID and was well respected across the world. Stephanie mentioned the 50% focus on fragile and conflict-affected states.
The realities are that we are cutting our aid programme to many of the world’s poorest countries. About 36 African countries get no UK aid since the aid cuts last year, and that includes many of the poorest countries in the world—in the Sahel, for example. We have hugely pulled out of countries in the Middle East. We definitely worry that there is less focus on where the need is greatest and more focus on where it is in the UK’s national and security interests. The balance between where the money goes is now focused less on the poorest countries and more on middle-income countries. For us that is a concern because, in the long term, ignoring the poorest, most fragile and most conflict-affected countries will come back to bite us. There will be humanitarian emergencies and we will have to try to respond to those crises in the long term. Prevention is always cheaper than cure. We think that a focus away from some of those structural, long-term development issues is a bit short-sighted. We are looking forward to seeing how that will be addressed in the international development strategy.
The Chair: Thank you very much for putting your answers in the context of the expected strategy on aid. We have already noted that the language has changed. A couple of weeks ago the Government were talking in terms of the strategy being published “very shortly”; in the letter from the Foreign Secretary to us just last week, that has now slipped back to “in the spring”. Clearly we have a long time to wait for it yet.
Q2 Baroness Blackstone: In a sense you have partially answered my question, but I wonder whether I can push you to take what you said a little further. First, can you comment on the Government’s apparent objective for a cultural merger between the two departments? As far as you can see, has the culture of DfID had any kind of impact on the way in which the merged department operates—its vision and values, and so on? I wonder whether you can put a little more flesh on what you were implying earlier, which was that development really is not at the heart of the new department and has to some extent been sidelined. If you could illustrate that, it would be helpful to the committee.
Stephanie Draper: We saw that the culture merger was moving ahead and was then thrown off by the aid cuts. That really undermined the bringing together of the new department, because it was such a massive process. Lots of things have diverted from bringing those two cultures together to the benefit of the UK and the world.
There are a few examples. One of the things that we think was really leading within DfID was transparency and being accountable to the British people and the people we work with for the aid budget. DfID consistently received a very good rating in the Aid Transparency Index, while the Foreign Office, as was, received a fair rating. That is one of the indicators that we have been looking at to review how well the merger has gone.
We have 15 hallmarks that we have been tracking, and a lot of them are dependent on the international development strategy. On our last assessment, which was six months in, we said that two were met, eight were partially met and five were not met. One of the ones we are concerned about is transparency. We have not seen transparency on how the ODA budget is being spent. We are hearing reports of things such as NGOs not being able to speak about their work, and the data on the cuts has been very fragmented and inconsistent. The new department is not as transparent and accountable as DfID was.
We have also seen that engagement with civil society is somewhat patchy. That has improved under the current Foreign Secretary. It was pretty woeful once the new department was merged, but now we are seeing more of that engagement, which we think is a really important cultural piece. We have been able to add value in dialogue on Afghanistan, for example, bringing in on-the-ground experience, being able to bring together a number of agendas and engaging on things such as the Summit for Democracy.
The final cultural element is the make-up of the leadership team. After six months, two out of eight directors-general had development backgrounds. We now have Moazzam Malik leaving the leadership team but Nick Dyer joining, so that maintains some development expertise. The other element of that culture is: do we have the expertise, the staff and the resourcing staying within the department and being able to add value? That starts with the leadership team, and we are still concerned about the balance of that. We understand from reports that a number of DfID staff have left, so there has been something of a brain drain as well, which does not give that real strength of merging two cultures, rather than one culture taking over the other.
Baroness Blackstone: I am interested in your final point about what you called a brain drain of DfID staff. Are these senior people who had a leadership role in the former department, or mainly younger people? Why are they going?
Stephanie Draper: I do not know the answer to that question. Devex reported in September that 213 DfID staff had left since the merger, and we see that leaving continue. They are in specialist areas such as nutrition, WASH, and sexual and reproductive health. It is that real expertise that seems to be leaving the department, which has been a model of UK leadership around the world.
Baroness Blackstone: And they are not being replaced by other people with similar expertise, as far as you know.
Stephanie Draper: One of the things we are seeing, in practical terms, is that there are a lot of vacancies; the merger is not fully operational. You might be losing that long-term expertise, which is more difficult to replace, but it is also happening in areas such as procurement. We understand that nearly a fifth of the procurement department jobs are vacant. A lot of things still need to be worked out. That makes things more difficult and makes our focus on development more difficult to maintain.
The Chair: I apologise for the noises off. We have a generator outside, and clearly the dustbin men and women have just arrived. Apologies for any interruption to the sound quality. It is not the fault of the technicians sitting behind me; it is outside.
Q3 Baroness Sugg: Thank you for joining us. You talked about the recent improved engagement with civil society under the new Foreign Secretary. Can you say a bit more about the impact of the merger on delivery partnerships with aid agencies? How has the fact that aid agencies are now working with what is the main organ of the UK’s diplomatic service affected those relationships?
Stephanie Draper: It is mixed. In reality, we are seeing that, from a delivery partner perspective, there is a lot of uncertainty. DfID and FCO teams are still operating separately. Although everything is branded FCDO, there are still different templates, policies and approaches. That is more complicated to deal with, as it is not always clear where to submit information or find out about opportunities. At the same time, that loss of institutional knowledge means that we spend time having to explain to former FCO staff how our work works, what the development challenges are and how work needs to be more long term. There are lots of those sorts of anecdotal examples; our members are having to spend more time working through and explaining work as delivery partners than they had to before. That is how that is working practically on the ground.
Then we have things such as the business planning process taking longer because we did not have the IDS, so there is greater uncertainty. Budget projects are still being allocated at the moment, so no decisions have been made. For really impactful long-term projects, you need that certainty to keep moving; you cannot be pausing every so often. We had a period of annual budgeting, which we hope will be improved now that we are into slightly longer budget cycles. I do not know whether Simon wants to add anything to that.
Simon Starling: There are still some different systems in operation, which makes it more challenging for delivery partners to engage. During the period of the aid cuts, communication from the FCDO was very limited, so communication and trust need to be rebuilt a little. Normal service has not yet resumed, so there has been a very disruptive period. The FCDO is still trying to merge the systems together and there have been lots of changes in staff, so relationships with delivery partners have changed. Delivery partners have been in the dark about whether their programmes will continue in the longer term. As Stephanie said, the general relationships between civil society and the FCDO are starting to improve now, but there are still some gaps as the merger becomes more operational.
Baroness Sugg: To follow up on that point, there have been various rounds of cuts. The first were with the reduction in GNI because of the pandemic, and then there was the cut from 0.7% to 0.5%. That first one was done when there was a DfID and the second when there was an FCDO. Can you reflect on the difference you have felt, on the decisions around the cuts, since the merger?
Stephanie Draper: When it was DfID there was more engagement with civil society around the cuts, but it was still hard to understand exactly what was happening during those cuts. In the last round of cuts, we have had very little information and transparency has been very low. It is still not clear where the money is being spent. We are still having to piece together to get a complete picture of where the cuts have happened, where various pieces of funding are continuing and where those allocations are happening.
The Chair: Thank you. Simon, do you have anything to add to that?
Simon Starling: I support what Stephanie said. The cut from 0.7% to 0.5% was such a huge cut—around £4 billion—in quite a short timeframe. Obviously, we would have preferred more engagement about how those choices were being made. It left organisations not knowing; the uncertainty was a problem. People had to close programmes because they did not know what was going to happen. That lack of transparency and the speed of that process were challenging for us all, and I think that is what the NAO report tomorrow will focus on. It will be interesting to look at that.
Q4 Baroness Fall: We have talked a bit about the relationship with delivery partners. I am interested in what you think about the lack of a specific Minister on the world stage and how that is affecting our reputation. You mentioned accountability. Within Parliament and at home, having a joint Minister leads to just one round of questions, not two. I am interested in your thoughts on that.
Stephanie Draper: We think that we really suffer from not having a Cabinet-level Minister for international development. To come back to the cuts, the cuts to the ODA budget mean that we are less able to respond to increasing numbers of humanitarian crises around the world, whether driven by conflict or climate. That is very much coming to the fore with needing to find, rightly, additional funds for Ukraine on top of Afghanistan, the existing crises in Yemen and the coming famine—it is not coming any more—in the Horn of Africa. If that had been brought to the fore in the Cabinet, a different decision might have been made.
With the best will in the world, the Foreign Secretary has many responsibilities. She is also Secretary of State for Equalities and Brexit, and she has been focused on visiting countries that are about our relationship on security, technology or trade. Liz Truss has visited India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Australia, Russia, Estonia and the US. That is an appropriate focus for a Foreign Secretary, but a Minister for Development would visit very different places and bring a different long-term perspective to the Cabinet. We think that is something that could easily be addressed and would add real value to the UK and to the people we work with.
Baroness Fall: This comes to the core of what, for me, is an uneasy decision. It was interesting that Tony Blair, who first set up DfID, said in his memoir, I think correctly, that he had sort of created his own NGO, and there were issues with that. But the problem with it going back to the FCDO is that, although having aligned foreign policies is absolutely what we want, if you want to prevent humanitarian crises—conflict, famine, climate change—that does not necessarily mean working with some of your top trade partners, or even your top partners on the diplomatic side. To what extent is this a problem that is less about moving department than about how they actually solve those issues within them?
Stephanie Draper: The structure does not necessarily dictate the decisions that are made. What has happened is that there has been a loss of a long-term perspective. We all know that as leaders you have to balance what is right in front of you with what is going to benefit the world and address local challenges, such as climate change and inequality, in the longer term. Gordon Brown said there was a risk of the UK losing long-term soft power with a focus on short-term foreign policy goals, and there have been so many short-term foreign policy goals that it is very difficult for the senior level of that department to maintain a focus on the long-term benefits.
There are advantages to the merger that could be capitalised on. On Afghanistan, we had joint meetings that meant we were able to get political briefings and understand what was happening while they were able to understand what was happening on the ground, but it still took a long time. More specifically, you would think that bringing humanitarian work and sanctions together would work really well and we would get immediate exceptions for humanitarians as part of the sanctions regime, but that still took months to happen; indeed, it happened only after a UN resolution. Those benefits happen at the strategic level but also at the operational level. There is an opportunity for the IDS to address that, but if we had senior Cabinet responsibility then that could balance that out too.
The Chair: I appreciate that Stephanie has to leave us, and I thank her. Simon, is there anything you would like to add?
Simon Starling: The job titles of the Ministers within the FCDO are slightly terrifying. Steph mentioned Liz Truss’s range of responsibilities. James Cleverly has responsibility for international development but he also has defence, international security, trade, Europe, North America, Russia and Iran. Any one of those—for instance, Russia or Iran—could easily take precedence in the short term, and it is then very difficult for the senior leadership team to maintain a focus on the sort of long-term structural issues that ultimately we would all benefit from addressing. That is one of the challenges of the merger: how do you retain the long-term structural inequality and poverty-alleviation focus while there are so many urgent foreign policy issues and crises taking up senior leadership attention?
Q5 Lord Boateng: In response to Baroness Fall’s point, which I do not necessarily expect Simon to comment on, I do not think DfID ever saw itself as Tony Blair’s NGO. That is for another day, when perhaps Lord Wood would comment on that too.
I should declare an interest as chancellor of the University of Greenwich, which houses the Natural Resources Institute, and as chair of Water & Sanitation for the Urban Poor, both of which are and have been in receipt of DfID defunding and now FCDO funding.
I wonder if you could help us on this question: what have been the budgetary consequences of the merger? In practice, has it facilitated the transfer of funds from former DfID programmes to non-DfID activities? You described the responsibilities of Ministers, so there might be occasions when that transfer has occurred. Are the budgets still ring-fenced?
Simon Starling: That is a great question and I am not sure we will be in a position to give much of an answer to it, partly because of the lack of transparency about how the money is being spent. There is also a time lag in the official ODA statistics coming out, so we will not really see the detail for some time. We do not know.
What we can say is that transparency has been low and that the overall picture, as we talked about before, is that the big reduction to the ODA budget, and to bilateral programmes in particular, has meant that in practice some areas have been ring-fenced and protected. Those areas are largely the priorities of the Foreign Secretary, while the areas that appear to be taking the biggest cuts are the bilateral aid programmes. Although it is difficult to comment on specifics, such as movements between the FCDO and former DfID programmes, the development programmes are definitely taking a big hit in comparison to some of the areas that are priorities. For example, the Foreign Secretary is very keen on investment and BII, so that has had a budget increase, while at the same time we are seeing UK aid withdrawn from 36 countries in Africa and several 12 across the Middle East. So we are seeing quite a lot of practical ramifications of that aid cut, and choices are being made in that ahead of the aid strategy.
Lord Boateng: In terms of the transfer of funds, does Bond have any sympathy for the point made by many Caribbean and small-island Heads of Government, who are confronting real issues around sustainable development, that they have not qualified in the past for DfID defunding because of the definition of ODA, yet by any stretch of the imagination—certainly all the evidence of one’s eyes would demonstrate this—they are actually far from rich countries and are confronted by issues in relation to climate change and environmental sustainability that have not in the past been met by DfID? Has the FCDO shown any indication of a willingness to vire funds in favour of such small island states?
Simon Starling: That is a good question and I do not know the answer. The general trend is towards a focus on future trading partners, so we are seeing less money go into the poorest countries and those that do not have a much of a strategic or trading interest with the UK, and more investment in some of the countries where the UK has other interests, such as trade. Small island states may not feature much in the trade picture. The areas that we know the Foreign Secretary is interested in are around investment and security, and those are the countries that seem to be continuing to—
Lord Boateng: Have the environment and climate change not featured? The Government as a whole are supposed to be interested in that.
Simon Starling: They are, and it will be interesting to see how that pans out in the international development strategy. We have been pushing very hard to make sure that climate change is not dropped from that strategy. It is a government priority so you would expect it not to be but we are now talking about a very squeezed budget, with difficult choices about where the money is going to come from. Where is the money going to come from to pay for the huge crisis in Ukraine—out of the climate change budget or the African bilateral programme? Some really difficult choices are going to have to be made.
Q6 Lord Alton of Liverpool: Mr Starling, can I tempt you to say something about the recently announced changes to the FCDO’s structure, which seem, to the observer anyway, to be yet another disruptive round of musical chairs? What does that say about the success of the merger? In your view, will that restructure solve any of the challenges and problems that have arisen as a result of the merger?
Simon Starling: Stephanie covered some of this before. A more senior-level focus on development is good. The fact that only two of the eight in the leadership team have development experience is a worry for us. We want to see that Cabinet-level responsibility so that development is not lost from the FCDO. Although we would not say too much on the movement of the chairs at senior level, the concern for us would be that it is a signal of the direction of travel: the foreign policy concerns are going to take precedence over the development concerns, and we will lose that longer-term expertise.
We also worry about the partly understandable shift to focus on geopolitics and security as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. There is a challenge in responding to that in the FCDO while not losing the previous focus on helping those most in need around the world. That will be an ongoing challenge for the FCDO, for sure.
The other thing is that we hope the restructure does not impact on other areas. There are rumours that some really important directorates and departments might be under threat. We do not want to see wider, big changes to the FCDO portfolio. For example, there is talk about the office for conflict stabilisation and mediation, which we think is super important. I do not want to comment too much on changes of position at the top, but we must make sure that we do not lose that commitment to and expertise on long-term development or lose expertise in further key areas in the FCDO.
Lord Alton of Liverpool: One of the arguments for the merger that was put at the time was that it would consolidate the political ability to resolve conflict, for instance in places such as Tigray. It is not a natural catastrophe but a manmade disaster; starvation is being used as a weapon of war and being are dying in large numbers. Have you seen any evidence whatever that the amalgamation of DfID with the FCO has made any tangible difference in situations such as that, or in northern Nigeria? You also mentioned the Sahel.
Simon Starling: It might be too early to tell. There are definitely advantages to that joint approach. We have been working closely with the FCDO around the Afghanistan crisis. The FCDO was quick to set up a task force that covered all the key areas of the response, and that included the foreign policy approach as well. That was really useful; we were not dealing with two different departments in a crisis, so that was helpful.
The challenge around that was that the ways of working are still not quite embedded. For example, we saw that within the sanctions and humanitarian access piece that Stephanie mentioned earlier. There are big concerns about ensuring that aid money does not go to the Taliban. Those concerns and the sanctions effectively led to aid agencies being unable to operate quickly enough. That hindered the response and slowed it down. There are definitely lessons to be learned on that but there is definitely potential, although it is perhaps a little early to tell.
Lord Alton of Liverpool: Ministers also told us that empowering our ambassadors on the ground in places such as Pakistan, for instance, which has a huge aid budget, would enable those ambassadors to look as though they had some control over funding and to have greater political edge in the way they were able to take decisions. Is that your experience?
Simon Starling: Again, it is probably too early to say on that. I do not want to comment too much on the in-country picture without a bit more knowledge of what has been happening.
The Chair: Before I turn to Lord Stirrup for the last in our formal run of questions, I will say that if we have time I will open it up for questions more broadly and give precedence to colleagues who have not yet had the opportunity to ask a question. I see that Lord Campbell has already indicated that he has a question.
Q7 Lord Stirrup: We have touched once or twice this morning on the crisis in Ukraine. From a number of the previous answers, I have the sense that it is perhaps too early in the process of this reorganisation to tell exactly how successful it is going to be. On a number of occasions you have pointed to the fact that a number of posts are not even filled in the department. It is still an emerging picture, but one would have thought that the crisis in Ukraine would be an excellent example of how a combined Foreign Office and DfID can work effectively together. It is one of the greatest foreign policy challenges the UK has faced in recent years but also a huge humanitarian crisis. The crisis is not confined just to Ukraine, of course; with the number of migrants flooding into Poland and other countries, it is spreading further. Have you seen any evidence of such a joined-up approach emerging from the combined FCDO? If not, what further action would you like to see?
Simon Starling: One of the positives was that the FCDO reached out early on to Bond to start co-ordinating with civil society, which operates a lot of the programmes on the ground in and around Ukraine. We set up co-ordination mechanisms pretty quickly to have those conversations about how the humanitarian response can be delivered. That was a positive sign.
It is a little early to say how the FCDO has responded to the Ukraine crisis as a whole. It has moved things around and responded quickly in terms of the management of the crisis. As you rightly highlight, it is a huge humanitarian crisis and a huge geopolitical crisis. It is definitely dominating the FCDO, and that is very clear in the engagements we have had with it. Our worry is less the attention on Ukraine, which is right and proper, but that it crowds out other, equally difficult crises where people are in as much or more need around the world. That is our concern on that.
As I mentioned, the Ukraine crisis is fairly new, and in some ways Afghanistan might be a better example to look at because we have had a bit more time to look at it. There are definitely some positives about the way the FCDO worked there, but also some challenges around that in terms of how the whole-of-government approach operated. Learning the lessons from Afghanistan to feed into the Ukraine crisis response would be very helpful.
Lord Stirrup: To take the question into a wider context, Stephanie mentioned that aid programmes are long-term projects, by and large, and require sustained effort, but that the FCDO is focused on the here and now, short-term issues and crises. Of course, one always has to respond to crises, but one would also hope that the UK had a foreign policy that took a rather longer-term view. To that extent, would you say that the criticism is rather less about the merger than about the fact that the Foreign Office has not, in your opinion, been taking such a long-term strategic view and, indeed, maybe the Government have not been taking such a long-term strategic view?
Simon Starling: Yes, that is probably fair. Again, we will see a bit more when the international development strategy comes out, but the FCDO could have development at its heart; it could be very focused on the long term as well as the short term. We have not seen much of that yet. Obviously, Ukraine and Afghanistan have been huge crises and will have dominated attention. I suppose that the proof of the pudding will be how money gets allocated, what the priorities are and whether there is that long-term strategic investment in conflict prevention, for example, which will prevent some of these crises becoming so bad in future. Can the FCDO manage both of those challenges?
The biggest geopolitical crisis in generations in Ukraine, hundreds of other crises around the world, climate change, a global pandemic: there is a lot on the FCDO’s plate. It will be really interesting to see how it manages that tension between focusing on what is in the news right now, what challenges the UK’s own security and national interests, and that longer-term focus on reducing inequality and poverty and preventing conflict. It certainly will not be easy. We are already seeing difficult choices being made about where the focus and the money go.
Q8 Lord Campbell of Pittenweem: I declare an interest as an ambassador for the charity Halo. As I think you know, it is responsible for mine clearance and, increasingly, improvised explosive devices. At the moment it is operating in Afghanistan with the acceptance of the Taliban. I am trying to avoid special pleading, but you raised the question of how priorities are to be identified and implemented. As it happens, the funding for Halo in Afghanistan comes from Germany and the United States. Do you think the new structure is sufficiently flexible to allow for the change of priorities and emphasis, or do you think that changes of priorities and emphasis will always be driven by what is current, such as Ukraine or, previously, Afghanistan?
Simon Starling: That is a great question and I think it remains to be seen. That is the challenge of the merger, is it not? Previously there was a separate department that was able to focus on the longer-term picture and was not pulled too much into immediate foreign policy priorities. There are challenges around having separate departments. DfID had the expertise to respond to humanitarian crises around the world, and did it very well. The merger will challenge the ability to flex and respond to different priorities as they come up. The merger is not really complete yet. There are different systems in place and lots of movement of people. Hopefully there will be that ability to flex to different priorities.
It is also important that some of the longer-term priorities stay the same. The FCDO is only 18 months old but we have already had several different sets of priorities during those 18 months. We would not want to see continually changing sets of priorities. Obviously, the real world happens and throws up new priorities, but the ability to maintain that longer-term focus will be a real challenge.
Lord Campbell of Pittenweem: I had not realised that James Cleverly has such a wide range of responsibilities. From any dealings I have had with him, I know him as conscientious and determined to do his best, but it is quite difficult to imagine someone given that range of responsibilities being confident that in every respect they will be able to fulfil all these obligations.
Q9 Baroness Rawlings: Stephanie Draper mentioned that in the old days DfID was accountable; I wondered whether she meant that the FCDO is not accountable. I go back to the days when Lynda Chalker was in charge of international development as part of the Foreign Office, with Douglas Hurd as Foreign Secretary. It worked superbly well and an enormous amount of work was done. I remember, because afterwards I was in the department, that DfID grew not just because of the 0.7% aid budget. With the buildings in Palace Street, the number of people who worked there and the amount of money it had—I was trying to look up what the DfID budget was—it did fantastic things, but there was a huge amount of waste. Nobody seems to mention how much the merger has saved the taxpayer but not on projects; the projects can still go on and be done. It is a matter of whether there is a really good DfID Minister within the Foreign Office, as we had with Lynda Chalker.
Simon Starling: On the point about accountability and transparency, according to the independent watchdogs and the IATI transparency system, the long and short of it was that DfID always scored very well in the accountability and transparency of its ODA spending, and the Foreign Office did not. Those two have now come together. We hope that we will take forward the high standard that DfID used to have, but we have not yet seen that, partly because of all these difficult decisions and partly, probably, because in the Foreign Office there was less of a culture of transparency, for understandable reasons. We really hope to see that improve over time.
You talked about projects and waste. That too will be one of the challenges because, again, DfID was a world leader in development and very well respected, with generally excellent projects that were viewed and independently evaluated very well. It was one of the most scrutinised government departments in the UK, so those mechanisms to ensure quality were there and were strong, and generally DfID performed very well. The DfID projects were considered very good value for money. Foreign Office projects that used overseas development assistance funding scored less well in value for money and reaching those most in need, so again there is the cultural challenge of how you bring up to the previous standards the work of the whole FCDO. That is another ongoing challenge.
Q10 Lord Anderson of Swansea: I was Lynda Chalker’s opposite number, and I recall the skill, with political clout, with which she solved the problem of Uganda by building bridges with President Museveni after his coup.
My question is simply this. Obviously it is difficult to disentangle the effect of the merger and the cuts. We know that the aid community is still totally hostile to the cuts. Has the attitude to the merger been reduced as a result of practice?
Simon Starling: I think we are waiting to see a little bit, particularly with the international development strategy. We were promised this strategy some time ago. It has been delayed. We have had several different Foreign Secretaries, who have wanted to put their own stamp on it. As I said, we have had improved engagement recently with the FCDO, so that is good signal, but the legacy of the aid cuts has obviously stung the sector. We are waiting to see what the Government’s priorities and the role of delivery partners are in helping to deliver the UK’s priorities.
A lot will become clearer for us once we see the development strategy and see whether development genuinely will be at the heart of the FCDO or not. We have mentioned already some of the signs that that will be a challenge, and that is a worry for us. The sector awaits reassurance that development will be a key part of the development, defence and diplomacy portfolio of the UK Government, as per the integrated review.
As people said earlier, there is not necessarily a problem with the merger itself as a structural thing, provided that we feel the reassurance that it is a genuine merger of two partners and that development is not lost within it.
The Chair: I thank you for your evidence this morning, and for Stephanie Draper’s, who was with us for the first half-hour of the session. You have given us an extremely good grounding for our next session. We will reflect very carefully on the main themes that you have brought forward. I kept hearing issues about a reduction in transparency in the way the Government may be operating in its relations with the development sector, which is a concern. Like you, we look forward to seeing the NAO report tomorrow and examining its implications.
