Source · Select Committees · International Development Committee
Recommendation 12
12
Paragraph: 85
Gender-based violence has increased during the pandemic, with the risk especially acute for groups such...
Recommendation
Gender-based violence has increased during the pandemic, with the risk especially acute for groups such as adolescents, migrants, refugees and displaced people. At the same time, access to support services has become more difficult. Therefore, it is disappointing that a specific commitment to the protection of women and girls from gender-based violence is absent from the FCDO’s revised framework for UK ODA. We recommend that the FCDO use the UK’s presidency of the G7 and COP 26, as well as its co-presidency of the Generation Equality Action Coalition, to publish a list of objectives which it will seek to achieve in combatting gender-based violence during its tenure and to set out how it will monitor progress on achieving them. It should also ringfence existing funding commitments to projects which seek to tackle gender-based violence. The FCDO should ensure that delivery partners administering programmes against gender-based violence can account for how their work is reaching survivors of gender-based violence and their support systems.
Paragraph Reference:
85
Government Response
Acknowledged
HM Government
Acknowledged
We are proud that the UK is recognised as a global leader in tackling gender-based violence, including pioneering approaches through our What Works to Prevent Violence programme that have shown reductions in violence of around 50%. The Government is deeply concerned about the surge in gender-based violence around the world during the covid-19 pandemic and remains steadfast in its commitment to prevent violence and support survivors. 18 Eighth Special Report of Session 2019–21 This year, the UK is further stepping up our international leadership on gender-based violence, wh8ich we recognised as a priority due to the worrying surge in violence brought about by the covid-19 pandemic. As co-leader of the Generation Equality Action Coalition on gender-based violence, the UK is working with our co-leads to develop ambitious actions and targets that will deliver real change over the next five years. These will be published at the Generation Equality Forum in June, alongside leaders’ commitments and an accountability framework to track progress. The UK remains a committed partner of the Call to Action on Protection from gender-based violence in Emergencies, a multi-stakeholder initiative launched in 2013 to fundamentally transform the way gender-based violence is addressed in humanitarian contexts. The UK is in the process of setting new ambitious commitments to support implementation of the new 2021–2025 Call to Action Roadmap, launched at UNGA in September 2020, and we continue to play a leading role as co-chair of the States and Donors Working Group. We have reoriented FCDO’s programmes during the pandemic so that survivors of gender- based violence can continue to access support. For example, in Kenya, we are supporting the State Department for Gender to increase the capacity of the national helpline and support a coordinated approach to services for survivors; and in Nepal, we are financing Women and Children Service Centres across the country. As mentioned earlier, the impact of the global pandemic on the UK economy has forced us to take the tough but necessary decision to temporarily move to a target of spending 0.5% of GNI on ODA, rather than 0.7%. We are now working through the implications of these changes for individual programmes. The Foreign Secretary has set out seven core priorities for the UK’s aid budget, of which girls’ education is one. As a key barrier to girls’ education and a widespread human rights violation in itself, gender-based violence will remain a priority for FCDO.