UK election: New development 'consensus' hides big challenges ahead

The United Kingdom’s opposition Labour Party is poised to take power in the July 4 national election, and its leaders are noisily condemning how the country’s “world-leading expertise in international development” has been “degraded” by 14 years of Conservative rule. The party’s election manifesto promises to “turn the page to rebuild Britain’s reputation on international development with a new approach” — but the reality is very different, said two experts brought together by Devex. What Labour is really offering is “consensus” in most areas, according to Olivia O’Sullivan, director of U.K. in the World Programme at the think tank Chatham House, and Gideon Rabinowitz, policy director at Bond, the U.K. network for organizations working in international development. No surprises Our Pro event was held before Labour published its manifesto last Thursday, but our experts correctly predicted the big ticket announcements: No restoration of the dedicated aid department axed in 2020, and that the U.K.’s massive aid budget cuts will only be reversed when “fiscal circumstances allow” — the vaguest possible wording, aping current Conservative policy. Meanwhile, O’Sullivan and Rabinowitz identified many other important areas where a Keir Starmer-led government will — despite its fierce criticism of U.K. development work — deliver more of the same. The ‘consensus’ When Andrew Mitchell, the current Conservative international development minister, published his strategy paper last November, he took the highly unusual approach of inviting Labour to help him write it — to ensure its lasting impact. O’Sullivan is confident that idea is working, noting how Lisa Nandy, who will hold the international development post if Labour is elected, has picked up its key themes in speeches and interviews. That includes debt distress, mobilizing private finance, and the urgent need to reform international financial institutions. “Labour are echoing some of the language in it [the white paper], trying to reform the ways that we help countries that are in debt distress, trying to make international institutions more responsive,” O’Sullivan said. It means the Mitchell blueprint “has been successful because it’s hit on or revived areas of consensus for some parts of U.K. politics on development.” Crucially, O’Sullivan added: “They don’t necessarily require the U.K. to spend more money. They are more about reform and international efforts the U.K. is seeking to be part of.” Rabinowitz added: “There does seem to be a consensus that we need to do more to ensure that aid and development efforts are led more strongly by the people in communities we’re trying to support.” He noted the white paper promised “a strategy around local leadership and development”, adding: “That is something that is quite likely to continue, although we might see it framed slightly differently.” The unspoken challenges Labour’s manifesto was silent on how it would stop billions of pounds being diverted from the aid budget to house asylum-seekers in the U.K. — perhaps an even bigger controversy than the cut from spending 0.7% of national income on aid. Rabinowitz said: “We can expect spending on refugees to continue to be high for at least the next year or two — and that then raises the importance of where is the additional funding going to come from, to help manage the burden of those costs and ensure we don’t see future cuts to [aid] spending.” He predicted there would need to be a further Treasury bailout of the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office budget, “to avoid that circumstance emerging”. O’Sullivan pointed to the additional problem of the backloading until the middle of the decade of the U.K.’s climate finance promises, with most of the £11.6 billion ($14.7 billion) pledged yet to be found. “There will be big immediate questions for the next government about whether they hit the U.K.’s climate finance commitments, many of which have been delayed until after the election,” she warned.