I aI am a researcher and principal lecturer in political economy at the University of Portsmouth. My specialism is UK development aid and the securitisation of development aid. I have published in this area. This evidence addresses the following query: “Whether spending from the aid budget to support refugees in the UK is an (a) efficient, (b) effective and (c) ethical use of public money”.

For context, I include the gross disbursements of DAC countries’ ODA for ‘Refugees/asylum seekers in donor countries’ from 2012 to 2020. 2020 is the latest year currently available. Because of different reporting systems within countries it is difficult to directly compare amounts across countries. However, we can see that the level of spending has been generally rising for the UK since 2012 and jumped significantly from 2018 to 2019 and 2019 to 2020.

I want to make three points regarding the extent to which spending from the aid budget to support refugees in the UK is an efficient, effective and ethical use of public money: Spending from the aid budget to support refugees in the UK will 1) undermine the UK’s own development strategy, 2) undermine the soft-power gains from development aid, and 3) negatively impact current and future recipients of UK aid.

Firstly, whilst in-donor refugee costs may fall within the OECD DAC definition of ODA, these costs do not support the UK’s own ODA priorities. These were set out in the latest international development strategy published in May this year. The priorities set out in the strategy are British investment partnerhsips, women and girls’ freedom, humanitarian work and climate change. In-donor refugee costs do not contribute to any of these priorities and in some cases are undermining them. For example, when explaining the UK’s commitment to humanitarian work, the UK International Development Strategy states that “The UK stands for humanity and dignity and is committed to unlocking the potential and agency or people trapped in cycles of crisis”. The current hostile refugee regime in the UK (funded in part by ODA) does not respect dignity or humanity and damages people’s potential through incarceration and criminalisation.

This mismatch between government priorities and spending on in-donor refugee costs, undermines the UK’s own values and commitments stated in the international development strategy. It is therefore not an ethical use of public money. It makes less money available to forward the government’s own stated priorities and also looks like a cynical attempt to reduce the UK’s aid budget further.

Secondly, funnelling ODA to in-donor refugee costs (along with the decrease in ODA to 0.5% GNI), will significantly undermine the UK’s post-Brexit soft power projection. Soft-power has long been seen as an important asset by successive UK governments. International development is an established aspect of this. In the 2010s the UK was able to use its international development reputation to its advantage to influence international norms and debates, and to gain seats within international fora. During this decade, the UK government promoted itself as an international development leader across a number of areas including transparency, governance policy, gender equality, and building stability through development. The idea of the UK as a global leader in development was part of the wider concept of ‘global Britain’, which sought to encapsulate the UK’s post-Brexit international outlook. The UK’s international development reputation is a long-standing, central aspect of its soft power, particularly in the face of growing Chinese soft power in the form of development investment.

The initial reduction of development aid at a time when the UK had lost international influence through Brexit undermined the ‘Britain as a development leader’ narrative, in the first instance. Shifting funds from external development programmes to internal refugee costs, damages the UK’s international reputation further and weakens its ability to use soft power to influence global norms and have a voice in international fora.

Moving on to my final point, repurposing ODA spending to support in-donor refugee costs will reduce the funding available to support international development projects in the Global South, unless the ODA budget increases overall. This will further negatively impact UK aid recipients, who have already seen essential development programmes cut or reduced. It is estimated, for example, that bilateral aid to Africa will fall by 66% as a result of recent ODA cuts.

In conclusion, spending the aid budget to ‘support’ refugees in the UK is neither efficient nor effective in terms of the government’s own development policies. Doing so will also further undermine the UK’s soft power projection and, more importantly, it will mean deeper cuts for UK aid recipients abroad.