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Child Labour
5. Mr. Canavan: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps she is taking to stop the exploitation of child labour in third-world countries. [314]
Clare Short: The tragedy of child labour, bad though it is, is not just the current exploitation of children but the fact that they are deprived of education, which will blight their lives permanently. We intend to strengthen our support for the International Labour Organisation's efforts in the developing countries to eliminate hazardous and exploitative child labour. Promoting universal primary education--an achievable objective throughout the world if the world community decided that it wished to achieve it--is a crucial part of the solution.
Mr. Canavan: I congratulate my right hon. Friend on her appointment. Last week Christian Aid published a report on the exploitation of children in the manufacture of sports goods. An Indian child as young as seven receives just 12p for hand-stitching an Eric Cantona football which retails in Britain at £9.99. Will my right hon. Friend appeal to all sports stars, sports clubs and the sports industry to co-operate with Governments, non-governmental organisations and the International Labour Organisation to phase out the exploitation of child labour and to introduce, where appropriate, special development measures to protect family income and children's rights to health and education?
Clare Short: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The Christian Aid report was very useful and we welcome it strongly and applaud the publicity accrued on this serious issue. I am also grateful to my hon. Friend for not calling for an immediate boycott of the goods involved. People who are concerned about child labour often do that, but it can lead to the children being thrown into an even worse
situation in which they have to live as beggars on the streets or are even forced into prostitution. We need the type of partnerships that my hon. Friend suggested.
We should like sports firms and others who find that the products that they buy are produced by child labour to use their influence to press our Government, the companies involved and Governments in developing countries to plan the phasing out of child labour. In many countries, parents cannot find work, but children are employed. In this respect, the history of our own country is an experience on which we can draw. There must be regulation to phase out child labour and ensure that children are in education, where they belong, so that they have brighter prospects.
Sir John Stanley:
Will the right hon. Lady focus particularly on the evil of bonded labour in those countries where it is still rife? Such labour is the 20th-century equivalent of slavery, and children especially suffer from it.
Clare Short:
The right hon. Gentleman is right. Bonded labour is a scourge of the world. As he says, it is akin to slavery and we shall take action on it. I believe that we should take whatever action we can, in co-operation with other Governments.
The proposal for a human rights clause in the World Trade Organisation so that no country can obtain access to the most privileged terms of trade unless it guarantees the right of labour to organise and that there will be no child labour and no bonded labour is one of the ways forward for the world. We shall join with the American Government and others in supporting that call, which will provide a long-term solution.
In the meantime, we shall take what action we can, wherever we can.
Mr. Corbyn:
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on her appointment as Secretary of State and I welcome what she has just said. Is she prepared to use the Government's influence on the World Trade Organisation to ensure that all future trade negotiations and trade strategies which are agreed will include a specific commitment to full recognition of all ILO conditions by all signatory states, as a major part of ending the disgraceful exploitation of children and ensuring decent rights for all workers in developing countries?
Clare Short:
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. We consider that the pressure for a human rights clause in the World Trade Organisation is crucial, not only to make progress on child labour but to prevent the globalisation of the world economy leading to the pushing down of standards across the world. Minimum conditions that all countries are required to meet before they obtain access to the most privileged terms of trade will provide a platform for everyone across the world. It is a very important change and we shall do all that we can to achieve it.
6. Mr. Baker:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development when she expects the
9. Mr. Luff:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development when she estimates that spending on overseas aid will reach the target of 0.7 per cent. of gross domestic product. [318]
Clare Short:
We remain committed to the 0.7 per cent. United Nations aid target and to reversing the decline in United Kingdom spending. As we said during the election campaign, however, we shall work within existing ceilings this year and next. I am currently reviewing expenditure plans and putting in place a coherent strategy to tackle global poverty, which will be published in the White Paper promised in the Queen's Speech. As we demonstrate progress, additional resources will be made available.
Mr. Baker:
I welcome the right hon. Lady to her position and congratulate her on her strong commitment to and understanding of development issues. Does she share my concern that this country now contributes just 0.28 per cent. of GDP in overseas aid compared with 0.51 per cent. in 1979? The rich in this country have had tax cuts, but the poor in many countries have lacked basic food and shelter.
Given the right hon. Lady's strong commitment, is she capable of persuading her colleagues--particularly the Chancellor of the Exchequer--to ensure that, despite the stringent financial conditions that he has imposed on the Cabinet, sufficient funds will be made available to meet the United Nations target of 0.7 per cent.? Will she set a time scale for that?
Clare Short:
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right: Labour's record on aid is a proud one--we reached 0.51 per cent. of GDP and rising towards the target. The Conservative Government, who so rightly have lost office, left us with a contribution of 0.27 per cent. of GDP--even worse than the figure that the hon. Gentleman gave.
We need a higher aid spend, but we need to spend our aid money better. We need coherence across all our policies on debt, at the International Monetary Fund, the World bank, the European Union and the Lome renegotiations. In that way, we can focus our efforts on the measurable eradication of poverty.
While I can hardly change the Department's aid spend this year--although I can do so at the margins--because it takes so long to work up sensible and strong projects, I am busy working to redirect our energies next year. It is in the year after that, however, that I shall need more resources because we shall have plans in place to spend the money properly. I hope and intend that that will be so.
Mr. Luff:
In adding my voice to the general welcome that has been extended to the right hon. Lady in her new role, may I ask if I am right in interpreting her previous answer by suggesting that while the Chancellor of the Exchequer may or may not have a warm heart, he is most unlikely to have an open purse? If those are the circumstances that she faces, can she give any clearer indication of how she will make the aid spend more effective?
Clare Short:
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, but I thought that I had been talking about that for some
If we work in such a way, we may then begin to believe that in the new millennium we shall see the end of abject poverty in the world. Currently, poverty affects one in four people. The aid spend is an important part of that plan, but it must be based within strategies which deliver progress; otherwise, money may be spent on good causes, but we shall not reach progress.
My right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer cares very deeply about that agenda and I am extremely optimistic that he and I will work beneficially together to get the progress that we want.
Mr. Cunliffe:
Will my right hon. Friend assure Labour Members that a Labour Government will never repeat the cut imposed by the Tory Chancellor in his Budget this year, when he reduced overseas aid by £180 million? That deliberate cut imposed untold hardship and misery on hundreds of thousands of African and Asian families so that the price of gin and whisky in this country could be reduced by 27p. Such was the motive behind that attempt at general election popularity.
Clare Short:
The Conservative party fought the election on a commitment to move to an aid spend of 0.7 per cent. of GDP, but year upon year the Conservative Government cut the aid budget. As I said earlier, they also gave up to 40 per cent. of our spend to the EU and thus lost control of it. Their record is poor. We fought the election on a commitment to halt the decline and to increase the aid spend and we intend to keep all our manifesto commitments.
Dr. Godman:
When my right hon. Friend conducts her expenditure review, will she examine closely the way in which Brussels officials manage the know-how and PHARE funds? In terms of devolution, surely Britain's contributions to the funds should be managed by my right hon. Friend and her Department.
Clare Short:
The know-how fund is managed from Britain by my Department, with the Foreign Office co-operating. The PHARE fund is a European Union programme; it therefore has to be managed differently, but it should be complementary. The spending on that fund, like that on all other funds, must be reviewed to make it more effective than under the previous Administration.
Dr. Fox:
The Secretary of State was correct when she said that we need to spend all our money better. Is she aware that Oxfam says that 19 water tanks, providing 28,500 people with 10 litres of clean water a day, could have been provided through our aid budget for the absurd cost of the Foreign Secretary's glitzy presentation of the mission statement? Was that money well spent?
Clare Short:
I have to say that that is an extremely cheap point--[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman served
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