Letter to the Chairman of the Committee
from the Commonwealth Scholarship Commission in the United Kingdom
I understand that the Foreign Secretary has
copied to you his letter of 11 March, in which he announces that
the FCO intends to withdraw its scholarship funding from the Commonwealth
Scholarship Commission with effect from May 2009. In view of this,
I thought that you might like to have a copy of my response, which
has been sent today.
I hope that you will agree that the withdrawal
from a commitment to which the FCO has had a 50 year involvement
should not be taken lightly. Having seen the Foreign Secretary's
statement to Parliament yesterday, I am particularly concerned
that the criticism which he ascribes to FCO's schemes generally
in the fourth paragraph are manifestly untrue with regard to the
Commonwealth (and. I believe, Marshall) Scheme. This, together
with the complete lack of consultation on the announcement, leads
me to suggest that it is based on very little concrete evidence.
You will see that my response proposes a constructive
way forward, in which the Commission, together with other interested
parties such as Universities UK, produce a proposal for how those
scholarships which would still be offered by FCO in Commonwealth
countries could be better administered. I very much hope that
he will agree to this idea, and would be grateful for any support
that you are able to offer in this regard, together with any enquiry
that you are able to make about the basis on which this decision
was made.
I would, of course, be very happy to discuss
this further with yourself or any member of your committee or
staff.
17 March 2008
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