Last week, Sir Keir Starmer announced that his government would cut foreign aid from 0.5 per cent to 0.3 per cent of gross national income in order to fund increases in defence spending. This is in direct contradiction with Labour’s manifesto of last spring, which promised to increase it to 0.7 per cent. While of course a time of difficult choices as the government looks to balance the books, the decision to decrease foreign aid is a costly mistake.
Foreign aid is about far more than international solidarity – overseas development is absolutely in the country’s national interest. Far from a mere expense, it must be seen as an investment for the future. The soft power gained by this investment acts as a vital foundation for the “hard power” that the government rightly seeks to achieve through its increase in defence spending. The pursuit of that international development is borne out in many different ways: through assistance in monitoring and containing the spread of Ebola in the DRC; through funding education for children around the world, which in turn fuels aspiration and sparks more affluent economies; or through providing essential humanitarian aid to the refugees of Gaza. The predominant reason for this foreign aid is to help create self-sufficient, prosperous nations that are far more likely to avoid conflict – a strong emphasis on international development is mutually exclusive with the intended consequence of increased defence spending: that of a safer UK and global community.
Furthermore, commitment to foreign aid would bolster Britain’s position on the world stage. Effective foreign investment would extend the UK’s reach and confirm its position as a major world player, especially in the wake of President Trump’s complete withdrawal of USAID. Trump’s isolationism presents the government with the opportunity to assert itself alongside other countries such as Germany and Japan as one of the front runners in international development. Instead, Starmer has chosen to do the opposite, and the likes of Russia and China will hurl themselves at the open goal; the more countries that become economically dependent on them, the more powerful they become.
The decision to decrease foreign aid is an easy option, one which will cause few battles within Westminster and fly under the political radar. It appeals to populist sentiments across the spectrum, who clamour for our political horizons to shrink closer and closer to home. International development, however, is essential to the vitality of the global community, and Starmer’s decision to retreat from it alongside Trump could prove to be a catastrophic mistake.
“Keir Starmer, 2020 Labour Party leadership election hustings, Bristol 1” by Rwendland is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.