Category: Uncategorized
-
Thank you to ConHome for an excellent summary of the Right’s opposition to aid
Over at Conservative Home they’ve done a useful job in summarising the vehement opposition to the aid budget from the centre right in this country…here are some highlights; “The annual international aid budget is approximately one quarter of the existing defence budget. If commonsensical economies were applied to the aid budget, they could at the…
-
Conservative Home’s Ruth Lea: Cut aid budget to cut tax for richest 1%
No wonder the Tories are opposed to the Robin Hood Tax – they’re proposing the opposite – to rob from the poor to give to the rich. Political Scrapbook reporting what we highlighted yesterday; Conservative Home columnist Ruth Lea has given the “same old Tories” brigade another round of ammunition, with her suggestion that the government…
-
Andrew Mitchell’s boring comments on Labour’s record mask his own shortcomings
Yesterday the Huffington Post published an interview with Andrew Mitchell in which he criticised Gordon Brown and Labour’s record for not being focused enough on results; “There was a lot of focus on huge headlines with huge sums of money. The key thing is that the results are delivered on the ground. Going on a…
-
BBC World Service should be funded by the FCO, not by UK aid
Despite other raids on DfID’s budget, responsibility for the World Service was spared from DfID at the Comprehensive Spending Review last October. Now that decision has been reversed. It was announced last week that £90m is to be given over 5 years to fund the BBC World Service. There is no doubt the BBC World Service should…
-
£200m of aid budget to be spent on St Helena airport – after lobbying from Lord Ashcroft
First posted on Left Foot Forward Today’s Mirror reports international development secretary Andrew Mitchell has approved £200 million to be spent building an airport for the South Atlantic island of St Helena. When news first broke of the proposals last July, MP Denis MacShane slammed it as: “A scandal of Pergau Dam proportions.” Why? Because the decision comes after lobbying from Tory donor and £127m tax avoider Lord…
-
LCID Statement on the Cannes G20 Summit
Britain is failing to lead on the international stage. In his speech to Conservative Party conference, Cameron tried to claim that under him Britain was leading the fight against poverty. But not only are he and his government failing to play a leading role in the G20, they are actively blocking attempts to secure a fairer…
-
A message from Ivan Lewis MP
Dear LCID supporter, I wanted to take this opportunity to write to you to introduce myself in my new position as Shadow InternationalDevelopment Secretary.In the Labour movement it is vital that we continue to work together to promote Labour’s values on International Development and hold the Government to account. The work the Labour Campaign for…
-
City AM reveal George Osborne’s real view on Robin Hood Tax
City AM reporting today that Chancellor George Osborne has serious doubts about whether a Tobin tax is viable even if it were applied globally. In a private letter sent to bank chiefs on Monday and seen by City A.M., the chancellor appears to contradict his public stance that he is firmly in favour of a Tobin…
-
Tory MPs £25,000 junket to Equatorial Guinea paid for by dictatorial government ahead of report on its ‘trivial’ human right violations, report Daily Mail
The Daily Mail, of all papers, reporting on the extraordinary news that three Conservative MPs enjoyed a £25,000 junket to Equatorial Guinea this summer just weeks before a report concluded human rights violations in the country were ‘trivial’. Nadine Dorries, Steve Baker and Caroline Nokes visit to the country’s capital Malabo was supported by the dictatorial government through…
-
Labour welcomes EU transparency rules for extractive and logging companies
Shadow Secretary of State for International Development Ivan Lewis MP said: “I welcome the European Union’s new transparency rules which have been published today. They are an important first step in ensuring that companies publish what they pay governments on a project by project basis. It is a positive sign that the plans go wider…
Labour Campaign for International Development 