Mozambique (Hansard, 8 March 2000)

§ Baroness Amos
My Lords, yes.

§ Earl Attlee
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her very brief reply. Can she tell the House when, after the formation of the DfID, the MoD and the DfID agreed their relevant contingency plans and the basis for charging?

§ Baroness Amos
My Lords, ongoing discussions are taking place between the DfID, the MoD and, indeed, other government departments on the best ways to respond to disaster and emergency situations. The financing of such plans forms a part of those continuing discussions.

§ Baroness Williams of Crosby
My Lords, I should like to congratulate the Minister on the efforts made by her department to commission South African helicopters to bring in immediate aid during the earliest stages of the crisis that has struck Mozambique. However, will the Minister, using her undoubted charm and intelligence, approach her right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence to see whether equipment for replacing bridges that have been breached by the floods and mending the main roads could now be considered to be a top priority'? Does the 1045 Minister agree that air transport is an extremely expensive way of delivering food and other aid to the people of Mozambique?

§ Baroness Amos
My Lords, first, I thank the noble Baroness for her recognition of the efforts that have been made by the Department for International Development. Clearly, the tasks of rehabilitation and reconstruction in Mozambique will be critical. Plans have already been made to hold a donor co-ordination conference to discuss the reconstruction effort. The British Government are doing all they can to bring forward plans on how best Mozambique can be assisted in that reconstruction. Those plans will include discussions with other government departments.

§ Lord Tomlinson
My Lords, does my noble friend agree that, in the view of the vast majority of fair-minded people, far from carping at the lack of cooperation between the two government departments, we should be congratulating both of my right honourable friends, Clare Short and Geoff Hoon, on the work that they have done? Does she further agree that it particularly ill becomes the Opposition Benches who, when in government, presided over the greatest cut in overseas aid resources that had ever taken place, which took us further and further away from meeting the as yet unattained obligation to the United Nations of donating 0.7 per cent of our GNP for development assistance?

§ Baroness Amos
My Lords, I agree with my noble friend. Not only should we congratulate my right honourable friends Clare Short and Geoff Hoon, but also our servicemen and women, all the volunteers who have given their time, effort and energy to work in Mozambique, the aid agencies and, indeed, the people of Mozambique themselves. They have had to deal with a situation which would be a challenge for any government. I further agree with my noble friend that this Government have demonstrated a strong commitment to international development. We have reversed the decline in the international development budget and we are committed to trying to ensure that the budget is increased to meet the 0.7 per cent target mentioned by my noble friend. Perhaps I may also add that I believe it is important for us to feel a sense of pride in the UK's response to the Mozambique flood disaster. Our response was immediate. In relation to this crisis, we remain the largest bilateral donor in Mozambique and we are committed to assisting in the country's reconstruction effort.

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, is the Minister aware that, for a large part of the public, the response did not appear to be immediate but rather the culmination of a protracted difference between two government departments over which the Prime Minister should have taken early control? Furthermore, if, as her response to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson, suggests, 1046 that was not the case, would not the best way to make the truth clear be to respond to the request to hold a public inquiry into exactly what happened?

§ Baroness Amos
My Lords, we must differentiate between the facts and how we respond to those facts. Anyone who saw the pictures that were shown on our television screens over the past week would be concerned. Members of the public do not have all the information that we in this House and in another place have to hand when planning the way in which we should respond to an international disaster of the kind we have seen in Mozambique. No operational delay occurred as a result of the discussions between the Department for International Development and the Ministry of Defence. We were one of the first donors to go into Mozambique. We remain the largest bilateral donor. We assisted the World Food Programme with helicopters even before the UN had gone into Mozambique. Those are the facts and the points that should be remembered. I think it would help us all if the press—who themselves used up scarce resources by using helicopters—were to report more of what has been beneficial in terms of our assistance rather than to go on carping.

§ The Earl of Sandwich
My Lords, even before this crisis, Mozambique was, quite rightly, a priority country for assistance, both in terms of development aid and debt relief. Will the Minister confirm that both development aid and debt relief are now being accelerated because of the recent crisis and that the Mozambiquans will in fact be better off once the crisis is over?

§ Baroness Amos
My Lords, I shall make three points in response to the noble Earl's question on debt relief. First, in terms of our own relationship with Mozambique, we have cancelled all debts with that country; namely, the aid debt and the export credit guarantee debt. Secondly, we are working to persuade other bilateral donors to whom Mozambique is indebted to cancel those debts as well. Thirdly, we are working to encourage the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to do the same. As regards our own budget, we are committed to spending around £70 million in Mozambique over the next two years. In addition, we have given emergency funding and, of course, we shall be open to support Mozambique in the reconstruction and rehabilitation phase once discussions have taken place about priorities.