HL Deb 29 January 1998 vol 585 c59WA
Lord Alderdice

asked Her Majesty's Government:

Whether it remains their policy to focus international development on the elimination of poverty and the encouragement of economic growth which benefits the poor. [HL203]

Lord Whitty

As my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for International Development has made clear, the prime objective of our development policy is to help mobilise the public will in the international community to meet the agreed poverty eradication targets.

We are seeking to achieve this by refocusing our own programme and strengthening our efforts with the multilateral system to ensure that we halve the proportion of people living in extreme poverty by 2015 and meet our other objectives.