HL Deb 27 November 1969 vol 305 cc1406-9

4.10 p.m.

BARONESS LLEWELYN-DAVIES OF HASTOE

My Lords, with the leave of the House, I should like to repeat a Statement being made in another place by my right honourable friend the Minister of Overseas Development. The Statement is as follows:

"The House will know that the Second United Nations Development Decade begins in January, 1971. Its purpose will be to help the developing world to achieve a faster rate of economic growth so that it may begin to have a fairer share of the growing wealth of the world. It is an objective supported in all parts of the House.

"The Government believes it to be of great importance that as a major donor country with a high reputation for the quality and organisation and size of its aid programme, we should play our full part in this new development effort. Despite our economic difficulties we have succeeded in maintaining official aid to the less developed countries at a high level during the life of this Government and we have greatly improved the terms of our aid in particular in the provision of interest-free loans.

"We have now examined our programme for the first three years of the Decade, and our purpose for the whole of the Decade in relation to the new target of 1 per cent. of gross national product set by the Second UNCTAD Conference and the particular recommendation of the Pearson Commission concerning this.

"Last February our White Paper on Public Expenditure gave estimates of £277 million for 1969–70 and of £235 million for 1970–71 for the total aid programme. Excluding the likely defence element in Britain's Special Aid to Singapore and Malaysia, this gives figures for economic aid of some £219 million for 1969–70 and some £277 million for 1970–71. "The Government has now decided that in 1971–72 all economic aid will be consolidated into one official aid programme and this will be increased from £227 million to £245 million, an increase of about £18 million.

"In 1972–73 it will be further increased to £265 million, an increase for the year of £20 million. In 1973–74, the last year of the present Public Expenditure Survey, the programme will accelerate by a further increase of £35 million to £300 million.

"These figures, together with the defence element in our Special Aid to which I have referred, will produce total figures of £270 million for 1972–73 and £305 million for 1973–74 which will appear in the White Paper on Public Expenditure. These figures are in cash terms throughout and relate to gross disbursements.

"These then are our decisions about the official aid programme up to 1973–74. This is the element of total financial flows from Britain for this period which the Government can determine and about which it can give a commitment. But private flows—that is private investment and guaranteed export credits—are the second element in total flow, as it is reckoned in terms of the 1 per cent. G.N.P. target. Net private flows, as well as net official flows count towards the target. The volume of private flows is not determined by Government, although it is influenced by Government policies. Their future level is difficult to predict and one can make varying estimates of the possible course of private flows during the 1970s. Taking a high estimate for private flows, we would expect to reach the 1 per cent. target not much after the date of 1975 recommended by the Pearson Commission.

"We recognise the element of uncertainty which is bound to attach to estimates of private flows six years hence. So we shall keep the progress of both official and private flows under review. In any case, the Government intends, unless our balance of payments position should preclude it, to reach the target of 1 per cent. total flow not a moment later than the end of the Second Development Decade.

"We seek the end of poverty where-ever we find it—whether in the Britain we live in or the world we live in. Hunger and disease recognise no national frontiers. No Government has a finer record than ours in the drive to end poverty at home. In a renewed and strengthen international drive to end world poverty, I believe that our new aid programme can make a vital and effective contribution."

THE EARL OF BESSBOROUGH

My Lords, we are grateful to the noble Baroness for having repeated that Statement. We on this Bench welcome the increase in overseas aid and only hope that in 1974 the economy will be strong enough, under another Government, to sustain the full £300 million. I do not think that the Government can claim to have done very well so far.

There are one or two questions that I should like to ask the noble Baroness. First, what will the net figure amount to—that is to say, less amortisation? If we take the figure of £300 million in 1974, will it be £260 million or what figure? May I also ask what the official figures, excluding private aid, will amount to then in relation to the 0.7 per cent. recommended by the Pearson Commission—that is, purely for official aid? Thirdly, could the noble Baroness say what she thinks the return on the payment of capital will be on the sums mentioned? Finally, I should like to know how our aid figures compare with those of Germany and France, whose contributions I think are already well above the 1 per cent. of their own gross national product. I note from the Statement that we can expect to reach this percentage, in so far as total aid is concerned, only in 1975, and then only assuming a high estimate of private flows.

LORD BYERS

My Lords, I should like to welcome both the sentiments of this Statement and the intention in it of the Government to try to honour the Pearson recommendation by 1975. But may I make a plea that we should have a much clearer statement on a subject as important as this? I find this extremely confusing. It muddles gross figures with net figures. I think I am right in saying that what really counts towards the target are the net official figures and the net private flows. If that is not so, this is what the Statement says. Yet we are given the figures in what is called "cash terms" throughout, which relate to gross disbursements. What I should like to know is an estimate of the gross national product in, say, 1973–74. At the moment I think that 1 per cent. would be £360 million. We are a long way off £360 million, and the figure will be higher by 1974. I should also like to know what is the estimate for the net official aid in that period and, if possible, what is the deficit that has to be made up by private aid. In view of the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Fulton, and I have Motions down on this subject, I would plead that we should have a clearer statement than the present one.

BARONESS LLEWELYN-DAVIES OF HASTOE

My Lords, this is an extremely complicated question. The noble Lord, Lord Byers, will know that these figures on aid programmes have always been given in cash terms. Admittedly this complicates the matter. I think that he himself answered the noble Earl's point about the 1 per cent. of the Pearson Commission, a sum which, as I said in the Statement, we hope to achieve not much after 1975, which in fact is the target date.

On the actual figures, I think that it would be better if the House had time to read and consider the Statement. This is a very complicated matter to discuss at a moment's notice. I cannot agree with Lord Byers's statement about £360 million; I think it is more like £338 million. But this again is the sort of thing we can discuss much more easily in a general debate.