Tag: conservatives
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LCID reaction to Report on Labour’s Education record
The difficulty of being part of a political party is that sometimes you stand accused of being too tribal, too colour-blind, too willing to defend the party line. LCID it is not beyond criticising and critiquing the Labour Party’s own policy and record, but we will defend it passionately when we think it has come under
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Harriet’s first speech outlines some critical areas for international development
This article was originally posted on Left Foot Forward. This morning, shadow international development secretary Harriet Harman gave a speech at ActionAid headquarters in London. Marking International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, Ms Harman outlined six key priorities for the future of international development: 1. Realising the 0.7 per cent GNP pledge
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Why did DfID spend £2m on the Pope’s visit to the UK?
This article first appeared on Left Foot Forward. A Written Ministerial Statement today reveals that the Department for International Development (DfID) spent nearly £2m on the Pope’s successful visit to the UK. The document states that £1.85m was transferred to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office “in respect of the papal visit.” This follows a written Parliamentary Answer by Lord Sassoon
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Tax Havens, Conservatives and the Developing World
After the recent investigation by Channel 4 Dispatches programme that Conservative Ministers, Andrew Mitchell the International Development Secretary amongst them, store their wealth in off-shore bank accounts, the question of the harm done by these locations and their practices are now being asked. The figure quoted in the Dispatches investigation is that for every £1
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Could the Government be about to destroy the International Development Act?
By Margaret Dantas Araujo Some of the UK’s biggest charities, Oxfam, CAFOD, and Save the Children, have publically raised concerns about the growing threat of securitisation of the aid budget. The use of aid for political reasons would be in direct contravention of the International Development Act 2002. The act, explicitly states, (1)The Secretary of
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Steve Cockburn asks: value for money – for who?
Writing for Progressonline, Steve Cockburn (LCID executive member), questions whether the recent calls from the Government to get value for money is truthfully aimed at furthering the interests of British foreign policy, rather than alleviating poverty. Some recent Government decisions back up Steve’s argument: One recent warning sign is the decision to spend what could
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Why do the Tories want to copy Canada on International Development?
It would appear that the Tories are looking across the Atlantic for their ideas, but not to Washington and President Obama, but to Ottawa and the minority government of Stephen Harper. Earlier this month shadow Tory minister for International Development, Andrew Mitchell praised the approach of the Canadian government to international development. In an interview
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The Tories announce their Afghanistan strategy, but there’s a lot left unanswered
In this article in The Times, William Hague and George Osborne are credited with announcing a new Tory policy for the development of Afghanistan. Their aim, so they say, is to draw on the military to carry out “quick impact aid work and infrastructure projects in the aftermath of fighting.” Surely this sounds like a
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Letter to The Guardian in response to their lack of scrutiny of Tory aid plans
Sir, I was disappointed to see The Guardian give a platform to the Tories international development plans today without any attempt to scrutinise them. The Tories claim they will not cut the aid budget is undermined not only by their record under Thatcher, when it was halved, but also by their failure to guarantee that
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Effective Aid: Building states, supporting citizens, transforming lives
Since the release of Dambisa Moyo’s Dead Aid, cynics have been lining up to call for the aid system to be overhauled or abandoned completely. Sajid Javid’s blog, rapturously received on Conservative Home, is but the latest to use lazy assumptions and selective evidence to pursue ideologically driven policies that would hurt communities across the
Labour Campaign for International Development 