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Millennium Development Goals

3. Chris McCafferty (Calder Valley) (Lab): If he will make a statement on the millennium development goals review in September 2005 in relation to sexual and reproductive health targets. [220739]

The Secretary of State for International Development (Hilary Benn): The millennium project report emphasises the importance of reproductive health and rights if we are to achieve the millennium development goals. Access to reproductive health is identified in the Sachs report as one of the "quick wins" for speeding up efforts to reduce poverty. We are working with others, including the European Union, to ensure that these strong messages on reproductive health are reflected both in the Secretary-General's report due in March and in the summit outcome document.

Chris McCafferty: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the millennium project taskforce report on child and maternal health and gender equality? It suggests a new target for universal access to reproductive health care by 2015 to help pull people out of poverty.

Hilary Benn: I am aware of that report. May I pay tribute to the all-party group on population, development and reproductive health, which has published a report, "The Missing Link!", that makes the link between the fight against HIV/AIDS and the importance of sexual and reproductive health? Around the world, 120 million couples do not use contraception, despite their express desire to plan how many children they will have. It is important that we give couples access to information to allow them to determine their own fertility.

Dr. Jenny Tonge (Richmond Park) (LD): I am glad that the Secretary of State appreciates and understands the link between good reproductive health and AIDS, which is such a scourge. He knows that the withdrawal of funds by the United States of America from the United Nations Population Fund has caused the loss of programmes across the developing world and diminished the prevention of AIDS and other diseases in those countries. What will he do to persuade the USA to resume its funding to UNFPA?

Hilary Benn: We have already done the most useful thing that we can do, which was to increase our funding to UNFPA, of which the UK is a strong supporter, by, if I remember rightly, an additional £10 million last year. UNFPA does vital and valuable work, and it deserves support from across the world.

Africa (Tuberculosis)

4. Paddy Tipping (Sherwood) (Lab): What support he is giving to programmes to combat tuberculosis in Africa. [220740]
 
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for International Development (Mr. Gareth Thomas): The UK is a key donor to the global fund to fight AIDS, TB and malaria, to which we have pledged some $280 million through to 2008. More than 60 per cent. of global fund grants go to Africa, and some $245 million has been committed for TB. We also fund the global stop TB partnership, support the global TB drug facility and have spent more than £1.5 billion on strengthening health systems, so that better care, including for those with TB, is provided.

Paddy Tipping: Does the Minister accept that there is a serious crisis in Africa, where around 10 million people are co-infected with HIV and TB? TB cases are rising by 4 per cent. a year in Africa, but in parts of the region only one in three have a full course of TB drugs. Will that issue be raised at the G7 summit?

Mr. Thomas: My hon. Friend is right to issue that warning. If TB controls are not strengthened, we estimate that an extra 1 billion people will be infected with TB between now and 2020, that more than 150 million people will get sick, and that some 36 million people will die. G8 countries and EU countries undoubtedly have a role to play in providing more funding for the global fund. We will host the global fund replenishment conference in September, when we will hold discussions with all those countries on further funding.

Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con): Is the Minister aware that every second of every day in the year, someone new is infected with the TB bacillus, which now infects one third of the planet? Given the spread of TB in Africa, does he agree that it is important to eradicate TB in Africa not only for Africans' sake, but because it is in our interests, given the movement of people between Africa and the UK?

Mr. Thomas: I agree with the hon. Gentleman that we must do more to fight TB. We must be aware of the strong links between TB infection and the HIV/AIDS epidemic, which is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State announced the doubling of our funding to the global fund last year and why we want to host the global fund replenishment conference in September.

Multinational Aid

5. Alan Simpson (Nottingham, South) (Lab): If he will make representations that no economic policy conditions be attached to aid from multinational donors, with particular reference to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. [220741]

The Secretary of State for International Development (Hilary Benn): The UK's new policy document, "Partnerships for poverty reduction: rethinking conditionality", states that we will no longer seek to impose policy choices upon partner Governments, including in relation to sensitive areas such as privatisation and trade liberalisation, as part of our aid programme. The World Bank and the IMF are both undertaking reviews of their approach to conditionality
 
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this year, and I will work to persuade those institutions only to support programmes which are agreed, rather than imposed.

Alan Simpson: The Secretary of State will know that developing nations are telling us that the hidden privatisation requirements that attach to debt relief programmes are making poverty worse rather than better. Can he tell the House whether he and other Ministers, in their roles in relation to the World Bank and the IMF, have ever made formal proposals that those conditions be dropped, and whether we are now dropping our partnership with the Adam Smith Institute, which has a vested interest in ensuring that privatisation is built into our programmes?

Hilary Benn: Indeed, at last year's annual meeting we did persuade the World Bank to undertake the review of conditionality that is now occurring, and I look forward to seeing its outcome. The point about privatisation—it is important that we recognise this—is that it in some cases it might be the right route to take, while in some cases it might not. My view is that that decision should be taken by developing countries themselves. Tanzania and Ghana have invited in the private sector to help to deal with the problem of getting more clean water to more people. That is where the decision should be taken, not by us as aid donors and not by the World Bank, and that is what I am trying to achieve.

Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con): In his document, the Secretary of State says, among other things, that we need to find a more effective way to strengthen countries' policy expertise. Will he consider seconding DFID officials to those countries where we now give aid mostly through budget support, in order to help them and their Governments to work up policy more effectively and to increase their capacity? DFID has more fast-stream civil servants than any other Department in Whitehall; perhaps they could be shared with some of the countries to which we give aid. [Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. Before the Secretary of State replies, may I ask hon. Members to be quiet?

Hilary Benn: The hon. Gentleman raises an extremely important point. In fact, we already do a great deal in that regard through the technical assistance that we give, including the use of consultants to work with developing country Governments, at their request, to build the kind of capacity that he describes. Without that, we will not enable them to be in a position to take certain decisions and to know what their consequences will be. I undertake to reflect further on his suggestion, although, as he knows, a lot of dialogue already takes place between DFID civil servants with the relevant expertise in the developing country partners with which we work.

Ann McKechin (Glasgow, Maryhill) (Lab): My right hon. Friend will be aware of the international parliamentary petition which has gained support from more than 280 parliamentarians here at Westminster and which calls for greater accountability of the World
 
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Bank and the IMF. Does he agree that those institutions need to engage more, not only with Ministers but with the elected representatives of Parliaments in the developing nations?

Hilary Benn: I do agree, although it is ultimately for developing countries themselves to decide to what extent their parliamentarians and public participate in the process of drawing up their own poverty reduction plans, and there should be nothing in what we do as donors that prevents that process from happening. I would positively encourage it, because a plan that does not have the support of Parliament and the people is less likely to be successful in making progress on reducing poverty.

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