House of Commons Hansard Debates for 1 Jul 1997 (pt 7)

School Absenteeism

Mr. Harry Cohen accordingly presented a Bill to place duties upon schools, local education authorities and parents to identify promptly and act as necessary in cases of child absenteeism from school, to ensure attendance or attention to the absent child's educational needs; and for related purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 28 November, and to be printed [Bill 35].

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International Development

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Dowd.]

3.47 pm

The Secretary of State for International Development (Clare Short): I am delighted that we have the opportunity today to debate this important motion. I see this debate as an important part of the consultation process in which we are currently engaged as we move towards the publication of a White Paper on international development in the autumn.

This afternoon, I want to talk about the single greatest challenge the world faces: eliminating poverty. I know that that seems outrageously ambitious--cynics might even say naive, but they are wrong. It is both an affordable and an achievable aim, and it is essential that we face up to the challenge if the 10 billion or so human beings who will then exist are to live in anything approaching peace and harmony in the second half of the next century. If we do not, the numbers of people might be much greater, and the strain on the earth catastrophic. As I have said before, those who believe in compassion and social justice should support that aim; but so should the selfish and the greedy, if they wish to leave the proceeds of their endeavours to their grandchildren.

It is my view that we are living at the beginning of a new political era. That creates a real opportunity for progress. In the past 30 to 40 years, we have gone through two extremes, both of which failed many developing countries: first, the bloated state; then, market idolatry--the period from which we are just emerging, and the adoration of which concept brought the Conservative party to such a catastrophic low.

Mr. Michael Fabricant (Lichfield): Will the Secretary of State give way, on that very point?

Clare Short: I will give way later. Perhaps, if the hon. Gentleman thinks a little before intervening, his intervention will be a little wiser than his interventions normally are.

Both the state and the markets are good servants but bad masters. Governments and markets must work together. Both must be transparent, and made to serve the people. Recent political events suggest that the people of the world are at last voting for social justice, both at home and abroad.

Mr. Fabricant: Will the right hon. Lady give way?

Clare Short: In a moment.

I am certain that that is what the people of Britain want. I know that it is a cliche to say that the world is becoming a smaller place, but we can now travel across it and see things in person, or on our televisions, that our grandparents would never have dreamed of. That is bound to change the way in which people think about world problems, and such changes make it feasible to seek to build, alongside economic globalisation, a global moral community.

Mr. Fabricant: The right hon. Lady has spoken of the relationship between international development and

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private co-operation. Does she recall that, at Question Time last week, she was unaware of the valuable work done by privatised water companies in providing free, clean water for people in developing countries? Will she now acknowledge the work done by Water Aid, whose patron is the Prince of Wales? It is doing that work in 13 countries throughout Africa and Asia.

Does the right hon. Lady accept that Water Aid's money comes from privatised companies such as South Staffordshire Water and Severn Trent Water in Lichfield? As she was unaware of all that last week, may I urge her to read those companies' annual reports?

Clare Short: I did know about Water Aid--[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant) has just spoken at length. Will he now allow me to answer him? That is basic politeness, if nothing else.

I have come across Water Aid's endeavours, and all such endeavours are welcome; but, in the face of the world's need for clean water and sanitation, Water Aid's is a small contribution. Charitable contributions aimed at improving the very bad image of water companies in Britain are certainly welcome, but they are not enough to make the progress that we need in order to supply everyone in the world with clean water and proper sanitation.

Mr. Fabricant: That is generous.

Clare Short: It is the truth. It should not be thought that such a tiny contribution, perhaps prompted by social guilt, is enough to provide for all the people in the world. [Interruption.] I shall get on with serious discussion of these serious matters.

All the conditions to which I have referred mean that this is an ideal time for the creation of my Department as a separate Department of State, headed by a Cabinet Minister. My Department's job is development, and nothing else. Commercial and political considerations are the perfectly proper work of Government, but export promotion and short-term political relationships are not the work of my Department. We have been given the most noble and honourable work that anyone could be asked to do--but this is not work just for soft hearts; it is also work for hard heads. There is no decent future for the world if we do not succeed.

Clearly, every generation has had the moral duty to reach out to the poor and needy, and to try to create a more just world. The present generation, however, must rise to the challenge; otherwise, global warming, population pressure, spreading deserts, polluted and over-fished oceans and water shortages will create catastrophes that will endanger the lives of all people and countries--rich and poor, northern and southern, developed and developing.

There is no privatised and purchasable solution to those problems. The grandchildren of the richest people in the world need a healthy planet as much as the hungriest street child living on the margins of existence. We must solve the problems together--and benefit everyone--or they will not be solved at all.

The United Nations special session on sustainable development has just ended in New York, five years after the Rio summit. Rio, and the process leading up to it,

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undoubtedly constituted an important moment in history. A good deal has been achieved as a result, in particular the mobilising of opinion--especially among young people--about the need for sustainable development and the importance of protecting our global and national environment. Binding conventions have been established for some global environmental issues. The outcome of the New York meeting was positive but limited, partly because the Governments of the developed and developing world see their interests so differently.

The process that started at Rio was about the rich countries collaborating with poor countries to help them to achieve sustainable development and reduce poverty. The global environmental facility, which exists to help poor countries to meet the extra costs of protecting the global environment as they develop is important, and we are committed to a further substantial replenishment later this year.

However, at Rio we also promised additional help to assist with the development of poor countries more generally, and the rich countries have not delivered. As a result, the developing countries think that we are more concerned with protecting our own way of life than about their development. If they think that we have created our riches by using up the world's resources, and that we are now imposing rules to protect our riches and prevent their development, they will, quite reasonably, refuse to co-operate. That was the mood at the beginning of the UN special session.

One of the Government's actions in New York was to reassert the basic Rio message that tackling poverty and protecting the environment are inextricably linked, and that eliminating poverty is essential to caring for the planet and is the bridge that unites the interests of north and south. An important part of the Prime Minister's speech at the General Assembly, which was universally warmly welcomed, was to commit the UK to helping towards the important over-arching goal, of which I spoke earlier, of reducing by half the proportion of people living in extreme poverty by 2015, and to reverse the decline in British development assistance.

Politicians often pretend to know everything. Conservative Members will know about that. Vanity is the occupational disease of politics, but, of course, politicians do not know everything, and the good ones have to understand that it is their duty to listen to people's fears and worries, find the ideas to create solutions, and mobilise action to implement those ideas. That is the second reason for this being the ideal time for the creation of my Department. The ideas are in place, and our job now is to mobilise enough political will to ensure that they are implemented.

There are two documents which everyone should read. The first is from the development assistance committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and is called "Shaping the 21st Century". It reflects the collective views of Development Ministers, heads of aid agencies and other senior officials who are responsible for development co-operation.

The report reflects on the lessons of such co-operation over the past 50 years and proposes strategies for the first part of the next century. It proposes a global development partnership effort that focuses on a limited number of key success indicators that are drawn from the conclusions of the great UN conferences of the past decade or so.