Select committee: International Development Committee
Recommendation 12
Fifth Report - Extreme poverty and the Sustainable Development Goals
Published 13 Dec 2022
Paragraph 64
Addressed to Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
International Development Committee Extreme poverty and the Sustainable Development Goals All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
We welcome the Government’s decision to appoint a Minister for Development who will attend Cabinet. We also welcome the response to our letter that the Government is still committed to the ‘Leave no one behind’ pledge, but we were disappointed by the lack of explicit mention of that pledge in the recent International Development Strategy. The then Foreign Secretary argued that such an explicit reference was unnecessary, but we disagree; words matter. The UK has historically been a global leader in poverty reduction. Those working in the development space all over the world and other governments will be taking note of the UK’s priorities. To maintain the UK’s status as a global leader in tackling extreme poverty, the FCDO should explicitly reaffirm its commitment to the Leave no one behind agenda, including achieving Sustainable Development Goal Target 1.1 of eliminating extreme poverty by 2030.
From: International Development Committee, Fifth Report - Extreme poverty and the Sustainable Development Goals (HC 149), paragraph 64, 13 December 2022
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 6 March 2023 (deadline 13 February 2023).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states that it is committed to the Sustainable Development Goals and to ending extreme poverty, and in response to the Committee's recommendations it largely points to existing strategies and programmes rather than adopting new structures.
- On a cross-government Global Health Strategy, it describes an existing "HMG Strategic Framework" and says Ministers "are considering options for communicating" it. No new strategy or six-month deadline is committed to.
- On the 0.7% of GNI aid target, it says it is committed to spending 0.7% "as soon as the fiscal situation allows", and states this was re-emphasised at the Autumn Statement 2022.
- On adding the $2.15 extreme poverty line to British International Investment's scoring, it says doing so was "considered and rejected at the time because it did not materially change the scores".
- On transparency and reporting, it has "made a public commitment to attain 'Very Good' in the 2024 Aid Transparency Index" and intends to update planned ODA allocations "in due course". On a 2023 Voluntary National Review, it says "No decision has been made".