HC Deb 05 February 1979 vol 962 cc28-30
45. Mr. Greville Janner

asked the Minister of Overseas Development how much aid the United Kingdom has given to India during 1978; and how much it is proposed to give during the year 1979.

Mrs. Hart

Total expenditure in the calendar year 1978 is provisionally estimated at £117 million. I cannot give a firm estimate for expenditure in 1979, but would expect it to be significantly higher.

Mr. Janner

Whilst I welcome that reply, will my right hon. Friend also encourage in any way she can the giving of voluntary asistance—for example, by the scheme proposed by the Chief Minister of Gujarat, Mr. Babhubai Patel, for the sponsoring or adoption of villages in India by Asian communities or others in this country anxious to help those who are desperately deprived?

Mrs. Hart

As my hon. and learned Friend may know, we have our pound for pound scheme. If any community organisation in my hon. and learned Friend's constituency wishes to put forward a proposal whereby my Ministry could provide 50 per cent. of the cost of anything that that organisation might wish to do, it must get in touch with the Ministry. We shall be very glad to help. We now have a pretty good aid programme to India, involving mobile health clinics and many things that are relevant to the poorest people in India. We are anxious to help with any voluntary scheme that anyone might propose.

Mr. Rifkind

Does the Minister recall the strong citicism of the Government's decision to supply ships to India out of the aid budget, a form of aid that has nothing to do with helping the needy in India but is helping to subsidise employment in this country? Is a similar deal presently being arranged with the Government of Pakistan?

Mrs. Hart

That raises another issue, and no doubt the hon. Gentleman will put a question down to me. There is a certain confusion here. We are talking in our aid strategy about poorest countries and poorest people. India is one of the poorest countries. It also contains many of the poorest people. If one of the development priorities of one of the poorest countries is ships, there is nothing irrational and nothing inconsistent with our aid strategy in providing them. We must distinguish between poorest countries and poorest people and see where they fit together.

Mr. Clemitson

Can my right hon. Friend explain the reasons for the shortfall in the take-up of aid by India, a shortfall that amounts to about £35 million in the past five years, about half of which has arisen in the past financial year?

Mrs. Hart

My hon. Friend has written to me about this matter and I am in the course of replying to him. I visited India in July 1977, and my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Trade visited India a little later. There have been problems. I think that we now have most of them sorted out, and I have every expectation that the aid programme to India will be, if not absolutely fully spent, at least much better spent than in the last years.

Mr. Luce

The Minister has not answered the question put by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Pentlands (Mr. Rifkind). What has the provision of £53 million in aid in the years 1978 and 1979 for the construction of six subsidised cargo ships in Sunderland to do with the alleviation of poverty in India?

Mrs. Hart

I must emphasise that India is one of the poorest countries. One of its problems is a shortage of foreign exchange. If India believes that amongst its development priorities having ships will assist its foreign exchange and resources, there is nothing inconsistent in what we are doing.