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9.19 pm
Barbara Follett (Stevenage): Development and development issues have played a central role in my life and in the lives of many of my constituents. I am therefore delighted that the Secretary of State is taking those issues so seriously. I especially welcome her remarks on the role
of women in development. Her commitment to the education of women and girls in developing countries will be a key factor in the fight against poverty. Women are pivotal in that fight because they are mainly responsible for the rearing and nurturing of future generations. Their education--or lack of it--is crucial to their children's mental and physical well-being.
Numerous studies have shown that a mother's education has a positive effect not only on her children's schooling but on their health. The studies also show that educated women tend to have fewer children than uneducated women. The beneficial effects of educating women are proven, which makes even more alarming the fact that 600 million of the world's 900 million illiterate adults are female. The problem is not confined to adults. Nearly two thirds of the 143 million children who are currently unable to attend primary school in the developing world are female. Unless we do something about educating them soon, we shall not reduce poverty--let alone eradicate it--for generations to come.
Education is only one weapon among many, but it is one of the most important. Without it, no amount of aid or trade can make a lasting difference. That fact was forcefully brought home to me 25 years ago in South Africa. I was working in a hospital in one of the barren and deserted homelands to which the old and very young women were exiled. I was a wet-behind-the-ears health worker, employed by a large charity dedicated to combating malnutrition. A woman in her late 60s came to see me because, she said, the milk that the charity had provided had killed her grandson. She took me to see his body. Her grief was terrible and dignified. It took me a while to piece together her story, but it came down to the fact that she could not read the instructions on the packet of milk and had unwittingly and lovingly starved him to death. I have never forgotten that little boy's death, although it was one among thousands and one among the hundreds that I personally witnessed in those years in South Africa.
At that time, the infant mortality rate for black children in rural areas was more than 50 per cent. In other words, half of the children born died before their first birthday. That was at a time when the South African Government were throwing millions of gallons of milk into the sea at Table bay every day to keep the price up. Half a pint of that milk each every day would have saved most of those children's lives.
That elderly, illiterate woman taught me a lesson, and I learned much more in the next few years about the appalling cluster of social, economic and political problems that caused the deaths of those thousands of children. I learned that young mothers breastfed for only a few weeks because they had to go back to the towns where the work was. I learned how difficult it was for the babies' grandmothers to find the money to buy feeding bottles. I learned how incredibly difficult it was for them to pay for the formula and how they watered it down to make it last longer. I learned about their back-breaking work scouring the countryside for wood to warm the water and, finally, how impossible it was to find clean water. If the women found water, it often needed boiling and without the wood to do so it was impossible to produce clean formula. That is how the infant mortality rate came to be more than 50 per cent.
The lives of those elderly women were appalling, but their courage was heroic. The iniquitous system of apartheid, which was at the root of those women's problems, has now been swept away, but the problems that apartheid created remain in Africa--and there are similar problems in the rest of the world. It is estimated that in rural Africa children and women spend up to 40 billion hours each year fetching and carrying water, and another few billion hours fetching and carrying fuel. It is not surprising that millions of children die each year from water-related diseases.
For those reasons I--and the people of Stevenage, which is twinned with a town called Kadoma in Zimbabwe--welcome the £120 million that the British Government have set aside for basic health services, primary education and the provision of clean water in sub-Saharan Africa.
Mr. Vernon Coaker (Gedling):
I shall make a very short contribution to an interesting debate, from which I am sure we have all learnt a lot. I could repeat many of the points that have been made--for instance, about the need for women and children to be at the centre of our development policies, and about the need for debt rescheduling and control of the arms trade.
There is one particular item to which I want to draw attention, however, because it must form an important part of the White Paper. That is the need for development education in our schools. It is an especially important subject, and if schools were to take it on board and if they were supported in so doing, it would help us to develop the sort of anti-racist attitudes and proactive approach to development that we want to see and would also help us to deal with many of the issues that face us.
Some development education takes place in schools already. As we know, however, schools are under great pressure and development education is one of the subjects that it is difficult for teachers to persuade pupils to take as seriously as they may take other subjects. Listening to the debate, we realise that the subject is one of the most important that children could learn about. Yet often, faced with competition from lessons such as mathematics, English, French and science, such important issues, discussions and aspects of education are squeezed out.
Mr. David Faber (Westbury):
As I am about to make a maiden speech of my own, of sorts, I add my warm congratulations to the three hon. Members who have made their maiden speeches today. The hon. Member for Broxtowe (Dr. Palmer) spoke warmly about Jim Lester--and rightly so, for Jim campaigned tirelessly in the House both on the aid budget and on many other issues. The hon. Gentleman spoke thoughtfully and with great poise, and I am sure that we shall hear a lot more of him in the months and years to come.
I echo the congratulations already offered to the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Ms King). She spoke passionately, she held the House, and at the same time she amused us all. Again, I am sure that we shall hear a lot more from her. Finally, I congratulate the hon. Member for City of Chester (Ms Russell). Gyles Brandreth, who is one of my closest friends, was one of my best friends in the House, so I am grateful for the warm words that the hon. Lady spoke about him. Her style, I am sure she will forgive me for saying, is somewhat different from his. He managed in the end to do away with the image of the woolly sweaters, but anyone who heard his speech seconding the Gracious Address last year would know that he is a hard act to follow. We look forward to hearing more from all three hon. Members in due course.
I echo the warm and fitting tributes paid by several hon. Members to my noble Friend Baroness Chalker, and especially that of the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell), who had first-hand experience of seeing her at work in the field. For 11 years, Lynda Chalker was Minister for Overseas Development; she worked tirelessly to alleviate poverty and promote good government throughout the world, and I was privileged to work as her parliamentary private secretary for more than a year and to witness at first hand the respect that she inspired in officials, charity workers and Ministers from other countries.
I hope that the Government will continue to support the clear principles that my noble Friend established in office: more trade, better government and less debt. I know that my right hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Mr. Goodlad) would strongly endorse my views.
I have sat through most debates on overseas aid during the five years that I have spent in the House, and tonight's debate has been no exception to the rule: it has been truly excellent, and has shown that on this issue there can be clear areas of agreement between the Government and the Opposition.
I am only sorry that once or twice Labour Members have shown a trace of the arrogance that we have come to expect from new Labour from time to time. All too readily, they have attacked the previous Government's record in the most party political way possible, yet whenever Opposition Members have tried to raise issues of genuine disagreement they have been accused of party politicking. The subject should be above party politics and I hope that we can ensure that that happens in future debates.
I warmly congratulate the Secretary of State and the Minister on their appointments. Our loss on the third floor in Millbank is undoubtedly the new Department's gain. Others have spoken of the passion that the Secretary of State brings to the job; from my time with Lady Chalker,
I understand her description of her task as a noble one, and I am sure that the right hon. Lady will see it through with dedication.
I hope that the right hon. Lady will listen to hon. Members of all parties. In a written answer to a parliamentary question she said that, in today's debate, hon. Members would
"have an opportunity to feed their thoughts and ideas into the Paper."--[Official Report, 24 June 1997; Vol. 296, c. 464.]
I hope that, on reflection, she will reconsider her expression of irritation at a perfectly valid intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt), albeit one with which she disagreed. I hope that there is room for all hon. Members to express a view.
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