Save the Children’s analysis of planned cuts outlined the effect of slashing funding
Tens of millions of people will be left without aid as a result of the Labour Government’s move to reduce overseas development spending.
Analysis carried out by Save the Children, and published in The Independent, shows the cuts will result in a reduction of key programmes for education, family planning, water and food aid.
Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) funding is set to fall to just 0.3%of gross national income (GNI) – the lowest level in 25 years - as part of a raft of measures by Sir Keir Starmer to increase defence spending.
This cut, the charity told the newspaper, could leave 12 million people without access to clean water or sanitation and result in 2.9m fewer children in education, compared to 2019 when aid spending was at its peak at 0.7%.
Foreign aid spend will reduce to just £9.22 billion by 2027, a substantial drop from £15.3bn in 2023.
The move comes despite Labour committing during last year’s general election that they would in fact increase international aid, never mind maintain it at 0.5%.
Dan Paskins, director of policy at Save the Children, told The Independent newspaper: “Breaking promises is baked into slashing the aid budget.
“But even the pledges Keir Starmer made in the same breath as announcing these cuts are at best back-of-the-envelope and at worst, disingenuous. These cuts cannot be made without delivering a hammer blow to his stated global priorities.
“We should not fund our response to one crisis at the expense of others. The UK is absolutely right to be supporting refugees here in the UK, but those costs do not belong in the aid budget.”
The government has promised support for Ukraine, Gaza and Sudan will be protected, the cost of which is around £6.98bn of the total £9.2bn budget.
This, along with other levels of funding that must legally be maintained, leaves a “black hole of at least £750m”, and “leaves no room for the £1.1bn across other projects – meaning tens of millions of people will lose out”.
That figure also includes areas that are highly unlikely to be cut, such as legally binding multilateral funding (£365m), Gift Aid (£165m), and the UK Integrated Security Fund (£406m) which tackles high-priority national security threats overseas.
Labour MP Sarah Champion, the chair of the Commons international development select committee, also told The Independent: “The cuts made to UK aid over recent years are nothing short of savage.
“The prime minister told me at the liaison committee that his recent decision to slash the aid budget even further wasn’t a choice he wanted to make. But is he fully aware of the true cost of that decision?”
A spokesperson for the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) did not dispute the estimates with The Independent.
They said specific cuts have not yet been decided ahead of the government’s June spending review, adding: “We will be taking a rigorous approach to ensuring all ODA [official development assistance] delivers value for money.
“Detailed decisions on how the ODA budget will be used will be worked through as part of the ongoing spending review process, based on various factors including impact assessments.”
