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Lord Drayson: My Lords, we have an opportunity next week, at the international conference that is taking place on Afghanistan, to encourage other nations to support us, as my noble friend described. There is a tremendous opportunity to support the development of Afghanistan, not least in terms of military capability, but also in terms of financial and other aid support. But I remind the House that this is a NATO operation, under the auspices of NATO.
To go back to the question that the noble Lord, Lord King, asked about costs and time, the ARRC headquarters is on a nine-month deployment, and the Helmand task force is on a three-year deployment. The timing of five years takes into account the cost of the build-up and the bring-back; in that five year time period, £1 billion is the total cost.
Lord Williamson of Horton: My Lords, this is indeed a substantial package and effort, with 5,000 troops at maximum and helicopters. I have complete confidence in the judgment of our professional advisers on what we need—and I thank the Minister for explaining that. But could he say some more about the "enemy", as the British public are interested in what we are facing? I know that he cannot go into detail, but are we facing relatively big and organised bands of military force, controlled by warlords, or are we facing a very diverse and mixed group of different gangs and types of military, but not very high-grade, operation? People have very little idea of what we are facing and why we need the troops, and for public confidence it is important that we should try to explain the situation as best we can.
Lord Drayson: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving me the opportunity briefly to describe the situation. There are three main groups. The history of Afghanistan is one of a complexity of tribes, which have battled both among each other and with other nations, such as ourselves in the 1870s, with imperialist ambitions. There are tribal groups of differing religious bases and sizes. There is also the emergence of religious-linked terrorist organisations. We have talked about the Taliban. But there is also a third group, the organised crime that supports the process by which the opiates are converted into heroin on the streets of the United Kingdom. We should not underestimate the complexity of the threat that we face from those three groups.
Lord Chidgey: My Lords, the Minister has made another reference to the Government's concern about the production of heroin in Afghanistan. This House will be aware that for some years, it has been the Government's policy to eradicate opium production in Afghanistan, which is of course a laudable concept, and to provide an alternative income stream to the Afghan farmers. That is a very laudable policy in principle, but sadly it seems to have been rather a
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substantial failure in practice. What do the Government now propose to do that is so markedly different from past efforts, which will result in some semblance of progress in the eradication of opium production in Afghanistan to relieve the suffering on the streets of our cities?
Lord Drayson: My Lords, I cannot agree with how the noble Lord characterised the progress in what we are doing in Afghanistan. If you look at the facts relating to the progress there, politically and in terms of the activities of security forces, and the economic growth that is taking place, you can see that we are making progress. I accept that it is not as far or as fast as we should like it to be, but Her Majesty's Government are spending a quarter of a billion pounds on supporting the national counter-narcotics activities in the next three years. We have learnt a lot about what works and does not work, and about the effect on the social structure of the country and the way in which you go about suppressing opium production. We have to increase the risks for the people who engage in opium production. The way you do that is establishing the rule of law, a sensible justice system and the power of the government. That is what we intend to do. We also need to support the farmers and give them an alternative livelihood. DfID and the FCO, working with the NGOs, are developing techniques which are working.
This operation is about providing the military support for the reconstruction teams to go into the southern Helmand province, where a significant proportion of the poppies are grown. Tackling this will take time and concerted effort.
Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville: My Lords, paragraph 21 of the draft Statement available from the Printed Paper Office had three final sentences:
"The ISAF mission is unchanged. It is focused on reconstruction. It does not include a role in counter-terrorism".
The Minister did not read out that final sentence when he read the Statement. What underlay its original inclusion, and what underlies its subsequent exclusion?
Lord Drayson: My Lords, the House will appreciate that the Statement I read was based on the Statement which my right honourable friend the Defence Secretary actually made 20 minutes beforehand in the other place. When I stood up, the debate on it was still taking place. What I said in paragraph 21, in reading out the Statement to the House, was what my right honourable friend said. There is no meaning to be read into that being included or not. I can look into this and give a full answer to the noble Lord, but I can reassure him that the Statement, which was in the Written Statement provided to the House earlier, had just been passed to me. It does, as he quite rightly says, state,
That is a fact; it does not include that role. The ISAF force which we are deploying is not going to be engaged in counter terrorism. Operation Enduring
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Freedom, which is being undertaken, has that role. It is not our role. Our role is in reconstruction. I hope that has been helpful to the noble Lord.
The Earl of Sandwich: My Lords, I welcome the continuing commitment to Afghanistan and especially the focus on reconstruction. The noble Lord will perhaps remember that there was some confusion as to the role of soldiers in reconstruction and humanitarian work. Is he satisfied that the aid agencies have been fully consulted, and will they again be consulted at the conference next week, about the contribution of soldiers to aid projects? He spoke of a secure environment. Does that mean that it is entirely a support role, and that they will not become operationally involved in aid work?
Lord Drayson: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Earl. Yes, the NGOs have been fully consulted in this process. That consultation is an ongoing process which will continue, not only during the conference next week but also as we deploy on operations together. The noble Earl is right to emphasise the important role that the Armed Forces play in reconstruction, either by, for example, our engineers working on reconstruction projects, or in the nature of the work that they do in helping to establish an environment whereby the rule of law and security can exist, and reconstruction can take place.
The purpose of this operation, and the quite formidable force structure which we have put in place, is to ensure that we are able to provide the security for the reconstruction teams to carry out their work. That is its prime purpose.
G8: Development Aid
2.44 pm
Baroness Jay of Paddington rose to call attention to the commitments made by the G8 on development aid and the case for fulfilling these commitments in 2006; and to move for Papers.
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I am grateful for this early opportunity in the New Year to take stock of what was achieved in aid and development last year, and to discuss how we best build on that progress in the next 12 months. I declare my interest as an honorary chair of the council of the Overseas Development Institute.
In fact, 2005 was a momentous year. "Make poverty history" became a rallying cry not just for committed charities and NGOs but also for national governments and international institutions. The UK Government can rightly be proud of their political leadership in steering global policy through our presidency of the G8 and the European Union. Major commitments were made, notably on increasing aid budgets and decreasing debt. The most prominent undertakings, as your Lordships will remember, were made at the Gleneagles summit of the G8 countries last July. There it was agreed that official development assistance in
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Africa would rise to $25 billion a year by 2010, more than doubling aid to Africa compared to 2004. In addition, the European Union members had already agreed last May to increase their overall aid to 0.56 per cent of their GNP by 2010. Here, in their general election manifesto, the UK Government pledged to reach the iconic 0.7 per cent of financial funds to these countries by 2013. Overall, the global amount of aid will double by 2010.
The Gleneagles meeting also agreed to cancel 100 per cent of the outstanding debt of the eligible 18 HPIC—highly indebted poor countries. This deal has subsequently been ratified and given teeth both by the membership of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. I am glad to say that Britain is now urging similar relief for all 67 of the poorest countries.
On trade, the third important part of the development agenda, the year ended less rosily, as the Doha round talks in Hong Kong made what can be described as only modest progress. There was some movement on export subsidies, and the talks did not break down completely as some pessimists had predicted. But in 2006 we need to see a strongly renewed effort to sort out this vital driver of development. After all, the potential results of a fair trade system eclipse the benefits of both aid and debt relief. Trade can be the single most potent tool in the fight against poverty. I know my noble friend Lord Sewel, and perhaps from his reaction my noble friend Lord Foulkes, will be developing this argument later in the debate. On a practical note, I understand that there are proposals now to reconvene the WTO Doha talks at Head of Government level, and to try to make further progress. Can the Minister tell the House whether this is a real possibility in the short term, or simply a Westminster rumour?
Overall, there have been 12 months of solid, successful work, led vigorously from the front by my right honourable friends the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the International Development Secretary. As Hilary Benn says in his latest DfID consultation document:
Perhaps the most significant long-term achievement has been to create a widespread international consensus on the importance of international development. In this, of course, the Government have been greatly helped by the enthusiasm of civil society all over the world. There is no question that one of the most energising forces behind the G8 decisions at Gleneagles were the Live8 concerts and all that they represented. Yet, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer said a couple of weeks ago, we must make sure that 2005 is seen as the start of something, and not the end.
What should we be doing in 2006, and how can we ensure that the commitments that were made last year are translated into action and, most importantly, into real change in the developing countries? We are constantly reminded that, on the ground, little has changed so far. I have just received a letter from
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Glenys Kinnock MEP, who described in horrifying terms the continued atrocities in Darfur. She noted that although Darfur might have come away from the media headlines, life in the villages was as intolerable as ever. She wrote:
"Everyday women face the prospect of being raped and beaten when they leave their homes simply to find food or firewood".
Today we have heard from the International Development Committee in another place that it is calling for renewed action, both on the economic and military front, from the EU and from the UN, to try to alleviate this tragedy. I would certainly support such moves.
In addition, there should be great pressure on the EU countries to fulfil the obligations they made last May, and again through the G8 in July, on aid in general. I have already heard it said publicly that Italy and Germany will take a very long time to meet their obligations. One sceptical, but none the less informed, observer has insisted to me recently that it will be 300 years before Germany reaches the agreed EU target on assistance. Can the Minister be more optimistic about the European donors, and give us some facts about how the aid is flowing?
In the UK we have recently had a difficult problem with our own expanding bilateral aid programme. Last week the Secretary of State confirmed that we are suspending budget support for Ethiopia, one of the neediest countries in the world. Until now we have been providing about £90 million a year. This apparently tough decision has been taken in response to the human rights abuse by the Ethiopian Government, and raises all the difficult questions about how to provide assistance to very poor people when their own official channels are both corrupt and abusive. In other words, how do we prevent more aid making the situation worse in so-called "fragile states"?
Part of the solution in the short term may be to be more flexible and imaginative about how aid flows, and perhaps to concentrate more on working through NGOs like Oxfam and Save the Children. Again, I believe that my noble friend Lord Hunt of Chesterton may speak further about that in his contribution later in the debate. But as the Overseas Development Institute commented last week in response to the Government's position, regular transfers of resources through budget support allow governments to build up core services, such as health, education, water supplies and road maintenance, and to pay for all the associated costs, including salaries. NGOs may be able to step in successfully to provide interim support, but are not well placed in the long term to run schools and health clinics on behalf of the government. As a result of the UK's recent decision, Ethiopia is likely to suffer from an outright reduction in social service provision, and there may in addition be macro-economic costs as the Ethiopian Government are forced to raise domestic borrowing to meet their own short-term commitments.
Situations like that in Ethiopia face the Government with some tough decisions, and there are very few choices in front of us. As we know, respect for human
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rights and democratic accountability are, in the long run, fundamental principles without which any sustainable development is unlikely to be achieved. But the case of Ethiopia is another example of how, in 2006, we need to look harder at the different options for delivering the expanded aid flows we have agreed to, and at the methods of monitoring and evaluation, not just for the aid budgets themselves, but for the institutions that are receiving and delivering them on the ground. This will probably require deeper and rather more complex analysis of social, cultural and political development in recipient countries, and can only be undertaken in partnership with those countries.
It was interesting that, at the Gleneagles meeting, the eight heads of government underlined the importance of the Africa Partnership Forum, created in 2003, as a key mechanism for monitoring progress. They agreed that the partnership forum should meet twice-yearly, and it met in London last October. Progress by African partners, as well as the G8, should be regularly reviewed under a joint action plan. Will the Minister update us on how that process will be taken forward this year? What benchmarks will be agreed to measure change? What explicit criteria can be adopted for policy decisions, such as that just taken by our own Government with regard to Ethiopia?
Most importantly, perhaps, can the Africa Partnership Forum be the driver for discussion and then action to improve absorptive capacity in developing countries, particularly in supporting effective and accountable institutions: in other words, acting through the forum to give equal responsibility and above all equal ownership to the African partner countries, to ensure the high aspirations of Gleneagles are properly fulfilled?
Gordon Brown has already called on the developing countries to produce a delivery plan for the millennium development goals, and intends to table the idea formally as part of a package of proposals at the meeting of the G8 finance ministers in Moscow next month. The Chancellor is calling for a new agenda of what he called "empowerment for development" during Russia's presidency of the G8 this year. As parliamentarians, we too should play a role in making sure that development does not slip off the agenda—this debate today is an example of that—and that it does not simply become last year's topic, whether for governments, the media or, most importantly, campaigners worldwide.
The other place took a significant step in that regard on 20 January when it gave an unopposed Second Reading to my honourable friend Tom Clarke's Bill on international development reporting and transparency. At the heart of that Bill is a proposed detailed report to Parliament on international development that can be both scrutinised and debated in both Houses. As Mr Clarke said in introducing his Bill,
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"It would also sharpen the responsibility of all Members to track the progress that is being made towards the millennium development goals and to push for action when that progress is not sufficient".—[Official Report, Commons 20/1/06; col. 1080.]
I am delighted that the Government have warmly welcomed this Private Member's Bill, and for the enthusiastic support it received on all sides of the Commons. I look forward to it arriving in your Lordships' House.
In conclusion, I think I can say without complacency that development is one major policy area where the aims of Government, professionals, pressure groups and the many general campaigners, as well as those with a political interest, are similar: they are very much in line. I was interested to see that DfID's latest consultation document, Eliminating World Poverty, raised the same kind of questions about the future that I have raised today, although from a government perspective. I look forward to today's debate. I hope it will form part of that consultation process and be of interest to the Government in taking their own aims forward.
Consultation and monitoring have their place, but beyond that we must ensure that there is continued and effective global action to make the millennium development goals a reality, not just in policy terms, but for those millions of people who, at the beginning of 2006, still exist in devastating and abject poverty.
My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.
2.57 pm
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