Recommendation 16

HM Government Deferred

Partially Agree 67. In our ODA allocations and interventions, the UK prioritises predictability and stability in departmental budgets. Current arrangements provide clear annual allocations and include break clauses in contracts to manage risk while protecting live agreements. These measures aim to balance fiscal constraints with programming certainty, enabling teams to plan effectively and sustain partnerships, while retaining flexibility to adapt to changing priorities. 68. We recognise that projects cannot always be supported through their full life cycle for a range of reasons. Recent ICAI reviews highlight that past volatility in ODA budgets disrupted delivery, weakened partnerships, and risked losing technical expertise built over years. ICAI’s 2025 energy transition review found UK aid had strong impact but its portfolio was broad and diverse and risked a lack of coherence. It also identified the need for patient investment to support developing countries to adopt or transition to clean energy, and the tension against the shorter timeframes within which private investors tended to operate (the required finance exceeds public funds alone). 69. Moving forward, we aim to prioritise multi-year planning and greater programming predictability, subject to future years’ budget allocations, to allow for stable delivery, sustained partnerships, and long-term impact. This includes supporting projects through their full life cycle, reducing fragmentation, and embedding resilience into programme design. By doing so, we will safeguard the quality and effectiveness of UK-funded energy access initiatives and maintain the expertise built through years of engagement. Partnerships (Recommendation 17, paragraph 91) The Government should ensure that funding through multilaterals offers opportunities to scale community energy projects. It should take a global leadership role to guarantee that communities benefit from energy access projects in ways that empower them. This could include facilitating the development of best practice guidelines, encouraging knowledge sharing on successful models and supporting co-designed pilot initiatives that demonstrate replicable approaches. Government Response: Agree 70. The FCDO agrees with this, and we are leading by example with our domestic commitments, mobilising public and private capital, forging partnerships, working with partners and utilising the expertise of UK PLC including from industry, private sector and our universities to accelerate and scale support for the global transition to a low-carbon future. 71. The FCDO seeks to ensure that all its programmes have a robust monitoring and evaluation approach to ensure that learnings on best practices and pilot initiatives are disseminated, to maximise the potential demonstration effect. This enables our bilateral programming to inform the multilateral system. 72. The UK’s long-running engagement with key Multilateral Development Bank (MDB) energy access instruments and dedicated funds, including the World Bank Group’s Energy Sector Management Assistance Programme (ESMAP) and African Development Bank’s Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA), has provided foundational support for Mission 300 and the associated initiatives that the MDBs are developing to scale energy access in support of countries delivering on their Mission 300 compacts. UK contributions to these MDB funds have provided a conduit for cross learning with our bilateral programmes, for mutual benefit and impact. We intend to continue this engagement in the coming period, further to the UK decision to emphasise multilateralism as a 0.3% donor, and actively influence, inform and drive innovations and community benefits from the significant multilateral investments in energy access under Mission 300. Public Benefits Conclusion and Recommendation 18 (Conclusion 14, paragraph 95) The Government should embrace the financial and strategic value of its development work, both in generating viable market opportunities and in providing insights that can strengthen domestic energy policy and practice (Recommendation 18, paragraph 96) The Government should formalise a mechanism for systematic two-way learning between domestic and international energy initiatives and formally identify ways UK businesses could grow their international footprint through community energy investments. It should be in place by June 2026 Government Response: Partially Agree 73. The FCDO works closely with DESNZ as well as UK industry to incorporate and share lessons learnt from the UK’s transition story. For example, our Green Cities, Infrastructure and Energy Programme (GCIEP) works with UK energy regulator Ofgem to deploy Technical Assistance in developing countries. 74. The FCDO has also been contributing to DESNZ-led energy access through our evaluation and learning. FCDO ODA MEL evidence suggests that longer term and more effective energy access outcomes require support to locally- led action and