My name is Habiba Banu. I co-founded and co-run Spiro, a charity that works on cost-effective Tuberculosis prevention globally, focusing on Pakistan. I also sit on the board of Giving What We Can UK, a charity that encourages ordinary people to give 10% of their income to the most effective charities. I have been deeply saddened by cuts to aid both in the UK and in other countries. I’m writing a response to two of the inquiry’s questions as I think there is a real moral imperative to make sure ODA is spent well and protected.
How should the Government be prioritising UK Official Development Assistance in the coming years?
● When resources are scarce, triage is more important than ever.
● We cannot and do not have to fund every type of project. Better to focus on simple interventions that can be scaled to large numbers of people, that are backed by good evidence, and that lead to lasting improvements to the poorest people’s lives.
● We should be very clear that value for money in UK ODA means maximising the impact of each pound spent to improve poor people’s lives not advancing British interests or any other goal.
● As the inquiry’s question suggests we do have to prioritise - which means stopping doing some things in favour of focusing our efforts on other things and gaining economies of scale from that. No choices are easy here but to prioritise where the money will go the furthest we should stop funding work in upper middle income countries and focus on low income countries. (I say this even as I run an organisation that works in a lower middle income country.) We should stop funding work with less evidence and focus on the “best buys” especially in health (such as cost-effective efforts within malaria control, family planning, vaccinations, teaching at the right level and others).
● Notably, I share the committee chair’s disappointment at the reduction in the UK’s commitment to the Global Fund. Multi-lateral institutions like the Global Fund represent some of the best value for money in global health.
● Beyond the question of prioritising within ODA spend, the bigger question is how should the government be prioritising ODA with respect to other budget items. The answer to that is that aid should increase back to 0.7% of GNI, excluding spend on accommodation for those seeking asylum, as soon as possible. It is deeply tragic that the government cut aid following on the heels of devastating USAID cuts. UK aid is something we in Britain should be deeply proud of and not rush to pull back.
How should the Government be communicating the results of UK aid, and its importance, to the public?
● The focus on results is crucial.
● Any NGO has an annual report totting up the outputs of that year’s work (insecticide treated nets distributed, children immunised etc.). A really good NGO can tell you an estimate of the end results of people helped (no. lives saved, people lifted out of poverty etc.) Most can give case studies or stories of the work they’ve done. UK aid should be held to at least the same standard.
● Whilst the government is transparent in making development spend publicly available on devtracker, the big picture of what those grants have achieved is extremely hard to grasp. Even as someone working in the sector who has a keen interest in my government’s spending, I cannot give you an estimate of the total outputs that were funded by UK ODA let alone the number of real humans helped by that work.
● Annual statistics of what UK aid has accomplished, explained in plain language focusing on the real people helped, would go a long way to making it understandable to the UK public what is being achieved and help everyone feel rightly proud.
Thank you for your consideration