As the UK prioritises defence over helping those that need it abroad, critics argue that cutting the international aid budget risks undermining global stability and tarnishing Britain’s moral standing. Has the Labour government got their priorities right?
The UK’s foreign aid has taken a back seat in favour of increased defence spending – but has Labour made the right decision?
The budget for helping people overseas hasn’t been this tight since the days before Tony Blair took office back in the mid 90s. Many are saying Keir Starmer is putting ‘missiles before medicine’, with the Oxfam UK boss going so far as to claim that ‘compassion has gone out the window’.
Writing for The Mirror, Dr Halima Begum claims the PM’s cuts ‘make a mockery of both the Government’s stated promise to stand in partnership with the developing countries and the pledge it made to the British people in its manifesto.’
‘More than that, it paves the way to a world where might is always right and we give up on any sense of responsibility to our fellow human beings. Foreign aid – as far-sighted Conservative and Labour leaders have understood in the past – has never been simply about munificence, but also cold national self-interest’.
She goes on to say that foreign aid does not just win hearts and minds overseas, but ‘buys us a stake in emerging economies, it is the best way to ensure peace in our world and addresses the root causes of so many of our current preoccupations, such as the Channel crossings, by making inhabitable again communities that have been rendered uninhabitable by war and climate change.’
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Deputy PM Angela Rayner has defended the cuts, stressing how much the world – and the nature of warfare – has changed, and the country needs to respond.
Writing for The Mirror, she said: “The threats we now face are more serious and less predictable than at any time in a generation. At this once in a generation moment, we must step up – and we will. The Prime Minister’s pledge to increase defence spending to 2.5% of GDP in 2027 means backing our armed forces after years of hollowing out under the last Conservative government.”
Rayner went on to say it was a ‘tough decision’ that had to be made. She added: “We are proud of our pioneering record on overseas development, and we will continue to play a key humanitarian role in Sudan, in Ukraine and in Gaza, tackling climate change, supporting multinational efforts on global health and challenges like vaccination. But at times like this, the defence and security of the British people must always come first.”
What do you think? Do you agree with foreign aid being cut to increase defence spending?