HL Deb 20 November 2003 vol 654 cc149-50WA
Lord Rea

asked Her Majesty's Government:

Whether they will, if necessary in conjunction with the World Health Organisation and the International Atomic Energy Authority, assist Iraqi health personnel to conduct an appropriate high quality epidemiological survey of the area of South Iraq which they control so as to assess persistent Iraqi claims of increased rates of cancer and congenital abnormalities since 1991. [HL5145]

Lord Bach

The allocation of future UK assistance for the reconstruction and development of Iraq will be considered in view of priorities agreed with the Iraqi authorities in the context of social and economic needs assessments produced by the World Bank and the United Nations for the Donors' Conference on Iraq which took place in Madrid on 23 and 24 October. These needs assessments estimated the requirement for Iraq's health sector to be 1.6 billion US dollars for the period 2004 to 2006.

At the Madrid conference the UK pledged a total of £544 million for the three years from April 2003, £38 million of which is our share of planned European Community expenditure. We anticipate channelling a significant proportion of this assistance through trust fund arrangements which are being established by the World Bank and United Nations. The total sum pledged by donors at Madrid was over 33 billion US dollars.

Any specific Iraqi request for assistance with an epidemiological survey of southern Iraq will be considered within this overall context.