Written evidence submitted by the UK Aid
Network (UKAN)
ABOUT UKAN
The UK Aid Network (UKAN) is a network of UK
NGOs who work together to advocate for more and better aid, from
the UK Government in particular. We also work with colleagues
across Europe, and internationally, to influence the aid system
more widely. Members include ActionAid UK, BOND, Oxfam GB, CAFOD,
Care International UK, ONE, One World Action, Progressio, WaterAid
and World Vision UK.
UKAN welcomes this evidence session and the
IDC's efforts to maintain scrutiny over the UK's performance and
future policy direction. UKAN's responses and concerns related
to DFID's 2009 Annual Report and the new White Paper on International
Development are presented below:
SUMMARY
The UK Aid Network recommends that the DFID
undertake the following in response to its Annual Report and 2009
White Paper, and requests the IDC to raise these issues:
— Aid increases—do all it
can to defend current spending plans in any immediate budget decisions
and the next CSR; and ensure a law committing the UK to reach
0.7% by 2013 and retain this as a minimum level for its aid is
put in place as soon as possible.
— Non-DFID ODA—clarify how
non-DFID ODA will be spent in the coming years and detail measures
it will take to ensure that all ODA spending is delivered utilised
solely for development objectives.
— Aid effectiveness—improve
its internal monitoring and reporting on aid effectiveness (especially
on its Paris and Accra commitments); this should be increasingly
informed by joint monitoring with recipient countries in-country.
— Technical Assistance—undertake
an independent assessment of how effectively its guidance on TA
is being implemented and take steps to prioritise this area in
the period to 2010 and beyond.
— Headcount cuts—develop a
strategic approach to further headcount cuts that takes into account
the importance of DFID's in-country appointees for promoting local
ownership, capacity building and gathering political intelligence.
— World Bank support—to ensure
any future allocation (especially the next IDA replenishment in
autumn 2010) and strategic policy decisions related to the World
Bank are based on demands for a more progressive and extensive
set of reforms.
— IMF support—more urgently
engage with the IMF on its response to the financial crisis and
issues relating to its conditionality, country ownership and of
course governance, and ensure future support is linked to progress
on such reforms.
— Accountability funding—detail
how it will be delivering increased support for accountability
in developing countries, through a strategic and coordinated approach.
— Conflict work—Explore and
put in place the measures required to ensure a development approach
is taken to the UK's work in conflict environments.
— Multilateral effectiveness—make
public specific plans for how its new approach to assessing multilateral
effectiveness will be implemented and also ensure that such a
process is transparent and open to scrutiny.
MAIN TEXT
OF SUBMISSION
The DFID Annual Report is an important document
for accountability and transparency and we have noted significant
improvements to it in recent years. However, UKAN does want to
raise a number of concerns about the content—approach of
the Annual Report and some of the issues addressed in this years
report:
1. DFID Annual Report
1.1 Aid increases—UKAN members
welcome the increase in UK aid delivered during 2008-09, further
increases planned for 2009-10 and 2010-11 and the restatement
of the commitment to reach 0.7% by 2013. The recent proposal to
introduce a law that aid will remain at least 0.7% of national
income in the future will help ensure these plans are delivered
on, if this law establishes 2013 as the date for reaching 0.7%
and a floor for aid levels. These commitments are more important
than ever given the significant impact of the financial crisis
on developing countries and the signal it sends to other international
donors about the importance of delivering on their aid promises.
We would therefore like the IDC to request DFID do all it can
to defend current spending plans in any immediate budget decisions
and the next CSR; and ensure a law committing the UK to reach
0.7% by 2013 and retain this as a minimum level for its aid is
put in place as soon as possible.
1.2 Non-DFID ODA—Over the period
2008-9 to 2010-11 the volume of UK ODA delivered outside of DFID
is due to increase from £0.6 billion (9.5% of total UK ODA)
to £1.3 billion (14.3% of total UK ODA). There is currently
very little clarity as to which ministries will be delivering
this ODA and what steps will be taken to ensure it is focussed
on development priorities. The fact that the International Development
Act does not cover non-DFID ODA makes this even more of a concern,
so one option might be to revise this act to cover all UK aid.
We would like the IDC to make public information about how non-DFID
ODA will be spent in the coming years and detail measures it will
take to ensure that all ODA spending is delivered utilised solely
for development objectives.
1.3 Reporting on aid effectiveness—The
section in DFID's 2009 Annual Report covering aid effectiveness
(Annex F) currently presents data illustrating DFID performance
in the 2008 survey on implementing the Paris Declaration on aid
Effectiveness and additionally separate data on predictability
and disbursements of budget support. However, given that the results
of the 2008 Paris survey covers DFID performance up to March 2008
and the Annual Report did not present much additional data than
the Paris survey, there is limited data presented on DFID performance
on many areas of aid effectiveness (eg use of programs, aid on
budget, use of country systems, joint work with donors etc; with
predictability the major exception) for the last year. This includes
a lack of reporting on DFID's performance in meeting commitments
made in the Accra Agenda for Action in 2008. It is clear that
DFID's own internal performance reporting on aid effectiveness
needs to be supplemented in the future, especially given that
there will not be another survey on Paris implementation until
2011. This monitoring and reporting should be informed as much
as possible by joint monitoring with recipient countries at the
country level, an area (mutual accountability) of the Paris Declaration
that has been most neglected by donors. We would therefore like
the IDC to request that DFID improve its internal monitoring and
reporting on aid effectiveness (especially on its Paris and Accra
commitments) and that this should be informed increasingly by
joint monitoring with recipient countries in-country.
1.4 Technical assistance—UKAN
members have long held concerns that the UK's provision of technical
assistance—which is currently around 25% of UK aid—faces
problems relating to weak country ownership, poor cost effectiveness
and limited sustainable impact.[97]
These concerns have not been assuaged by the failure of the DFID
to carry out a proposed assessment of its guidance on technical
assistance in 2008 and its failure to highlight TA as a priority
ahead of the 2010 deadline for achieving the Paris Declaration
commitments. This is despite the fact that the UK has not met
the Paris target on TA for all countries surveyed covered in the
last Paris monitoring survey and it has also not yet met its target
on TA agreed through the EU (100% of TA to be coordinated by 2010)
in 2005. We would therefore request that IDC instruct DFID to
undertake an independent assessment of how effectively its guidance
on TA is being implemented and take steps to prioritise this area
in the period to 2010 and beyond.
1.5 Headcount cuts—In addition
to our general concerns around DFID being expected to delivery
an increasing budget in increasingly challenging environments
with fewer staff, we are concerned that headcount cuts at DFID
seems to be falling disproportionately on in-country appointees,
potentially hampering efforts to localise development interventions,
build local capacity and act based on good local knowledge and
political intelligence. This is illustrated by the fact that the
number of DFID in-country appointees fell by 9% in 2007-08 and
by 23% since 2004-05, whilst the number of home civil service
staff only fell by 0.7% in 2007-08 and by 15% since 2004-05 (see
section 4.24). This is despite the fact that home civil service
staff outnumber in-country appointees by more than 2:1. We would
therefore request the IDC to instruct DFID to develop a strategic
approach to further headcount cuts that takes into account the
importance of in-country appointees for promoting local ownership
and capacity building.
2. UK Government White Paper on International
Development, 2009
The new DFID White Paper Building Our Common
Future highlights the critical international challenges facing
the development community in the coming years and exploring how
DFID can contribute in the responding to them. UK NGOs generally
welcomed this White Paper for exploring these issues and presenting
some significant proposals for tackling them.
UKAN would however like to share some more detailed
responses and its concerns relating to the White Paper in a number
of key areas, as below:
2.1 World Bank effectiveness and its
future role—The White Paper and other recent policy
proposals strongly indicate the UK government's support for the
World Bank to take a more active role in supporting countries
to respond to the financial and climate crises currently facing
the world. UKAN members strongly believe that any increased role
needs to be accompanied by reforms to make the World Bank more
effective, more equitably governed, more respectful of country
ownership and strengthen its adherence to international human
rights and other standards. Although the White Paper does present
a reform agenda for the World Bank, UKAN members believe this
agenda is not sufficiently progressive (it does not address all
the issues presented above) and do not match up to the effectiveness
standards set for the UN—a more representative and arguably
legitimate organisation—by the White Paper (future core
funding to the UN will be based on performance in improving effectiveness).
We would therefore request the IDC to instruct DFID to ensure
any future allocation (especially the next World Bank IDA replenishment
in autumn 2010) and strategic policy decisions related to the
World Bank are based on demands for a more progressive and extensive
set of reforms. This will help to ensure the World Bank is fit
for purpose and any decisions about its role in development are
more legitimate.
2.2 IMF and the financial crisis—The
White Paper highlights how the IMF has been given additional funds
to support developing countries through the financial crisis,
and also states that the IMF has an important role to play in
this effort. The White Paper rightly identifies the need for the
IMF to develop more effective instruments and allow countries
more of a say over how resources are spent. Recent analysis of
the IMF's response to the financial crisis, confirms that further
reforms are an immediate priority as the IMF is continuing to
favour contractionary spending policies, even though such steps
may hamper recovery from the financial crisis and reduce spending
on vital social services, and even where countries may have resources
to implement expansionary spending policies.[98]
We would therefore request the IDC demand that the UK government
more urgently engage with the IMF on its response to the financial
crisis and issues relating to its conditionality, country ownership
and of course governance, and ensure future support is linked
to progress on such reforms.
2.3 Accountability of aid/public spending—UKAN
welcomes the White Paper commitment to increase spending on accountability
in-country to a level equivalent to at least 5% of budget support.
Increased investment in accountability is a step we have long
campaigned for, given that aid is increasingly being delivered
through or involving government and this requires a concomitant
increase in investment in scrutinising governments. We would like
to emphasise that such an increase in spending on accountability
should be delivered strategically, ie following in-depth analysis
of the gaps in accountability in individual countries—especially
through engagement with civil society—and by coordinating
with other donors. We request the IDC to emphasise this point
and ask DFID detail how it will be delivering increased support
for accountability in developing countries, through a strategic
and coordinated approach.
2.4 Conflict and security—We
broadly welcome the increased emphasis the White Paper places
on responding better to conflict and security challenges in the
developing world, given that the most intransigent poverty challenges
are in conflict affected countries. As the White Paper emphasises,
such an agenda will require a more coordinated response across
relevant UK government ministries, which in turn creates challenges
for ensuring that such a coordinated response is driven by development
objectives. We have looked have observed with concern a number
of donors (most notably the USA) have allowed their interventions
in conflict affected countries to become dominated by military
and foreign policy objectives and approaches. These examples suggest
that a development approach requires particular institutional
procedures to be followed (eg a suitable balance of decision-making
and institutional independence) and perhaps legislative reforms
to be undertaken. We therefore request the IDC to raise these
concerns with DFID and to request it to explore and put in place
the measures required to ensure a development approach is taken
in its conflict work.
2.5 Multilateral effectiveness—We
welcome the emphasis the White Paper places on ensuring that multilateral
aid is made more effective in promoting poverty reduction and
development, given that an increasing proportion of the UK's aid
is going through such institutions. The range of criteria set
out by the government for making decisions about multilateral
funding—which include their governance, engagement of civil
society, accountability for performance and focus on the poorest
seems—seems to be suitable as well. However, the White Paper
does not make it clear exactly how the UK government will undertake
such assessments and make allocation decisions, and how transparent
such processes will be. We would therefore request the IDC to
request DFID make public specific plans for how its new approach
to assessing multilateral effectiveness will be implemented and
also ensure that such a process is transparent and open to scrutiny.
September 2009
97 See "Real Aid 2-Making Technical Assistance
Work". Back
98
"IMF austerity chills crisis countries", Bretton Woods
Update-July-Aug 2009, BWP. Back
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