Source · Select Committees · International Development Committee
Recommendation 9
9
Acknowledged
The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office must not lose its development or gender expertise.
Recommendation
The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office must not lose its development or gender expertise. The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office should commit to maintain development experts working on Women, Peace and Security with connections to local organisations and communities around the world. The Government must not cut gender advisor roles. The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office must provide gender advisors to support organisations like GAPS with their work in–country. In its response, the Government should set out how it plans to achieve this. By doing so, the Foreign Commonwealth and 34 Development Office should make sure that the delivery of the new National Action Plan does not lose its gendered development focus and expertise. (Recommendation, Paragraph 48) Funding & Resourcing
Government response summary AI-generated
The government partially agrees, recognizing the important role of technical advisers and stating teams are strongly encouraged to maintain dedicated gender advisor expertise, but does not explicitly commit to maintaining specific levels of expertise or providing advisors to support external organizations like GAPS.
Summary of the government's response below — read the verbatim text to verify.
Government Response
Acknowledged
HM Government · verbatim extract
Acknowledged
Government Response to Recommendation 48: Partially Agree. 31. We recognise the important role our technical advisers and experienced staff play in the WPS agenda. As we work through our new priorities, we will make decisions about how best to utilise our technical expertise and experience ad ensure that we have the right skills, in the right places, at the right time. This requires both short term flexible and long-term stable inputs, all closely linked to the delivery of government priorities. 32. The Government will embed women and girls’ empowerment across all our foreign policy. As referenced in the Foreign Secretary’s statement2 on International Development on 19 March, by 2030, at least 90 percent of the FCDOs bilateral ODA will have a focus on equality for women and girls, either as a principal or significant objective. 33. The Government has an enduring commitment to gender equality, WPS, Human Security, and social inclusion. These are essential components of effective national security policy. As such, the Integrated Security Fund (ISF) will continue to support delivery of the UK’s ambitions on WPS, and to align them with UK national security interests. 34. ISF teams are expected to continue to mainstream equality for women and girls throughout their work. This includes through projects which deliver specifically on gender and social inclusion, and which monitor impact on gender and social inclusion. To facilitate this, teams are strongly encouraged to maintain dedicated gender advisor expertise. 35. The ISF will also continue to fund the WPS Helpdesk – a cross-government resource which provides high-impact technical and advisory support and so enables the continued delivery of gender-sensitive activity in support of UK national security priorities, meeting our international obligations. 36. The FCDO has a social development profession, which is a group of around 100 technical experts who help to shape, deliver and manage our policy, programme and diplomatic work around the world on social issues. 2 https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/foreign-secretary-statement-on- international-development-19-march This includes working on gender equality, disability and social inclusion mainstreaming, preventing violence against women and girls, women, peace and security as well as supporting domestic accountability and civil society engagement, and improving welfare provision for the extreme poor. We are evolving our operating models for advisers to enable greater flexibility across teams and posts that allow for continued support on gender and wider equalities. In addition, we are developing a new Women and Equalities Community of Expertise to provide FCDO teams and partners access to internal and external technical specialists, ensuring our delivery remains informed by strong gender expertise and experience. Funding and Resourcing Conclusion 60: There is a lack of transparency surrounding the UK’s Women, Peace and Security spending, including how much Official Development Assistance is directed towards Women’s Rights Organisations, making it difficult for civil society organisations and other actors to track and assess progress on Women, Peace and Security.
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