OPINION: Rt Hon Justine Greening – why Britain’s 0.7% aid leadership matters

As former Secretary of State for International Development, I believe that levelling up, creating access to opportunities so that people can have a better life and fulfil their potential, isn’t just a domestic challenge it’s a global challenge alongside delivering on net zero. So Britain's leadership on meeting its 0.7% commitment matters.

Firstly, it’s the right thing to do. British aid and development has saved countless lives, from tackling ebola to the millions of vaccinations and being a key part of the work to steadily rid the world of polio. Our aid work has helped deliver crucial help to people caught up in humanitarian crises like Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines or the earthquake in Nepal. And it has provided assistance to families who’ve had no choice but to leave their homes, such as the 5.6m Syrian refugees, not only helping to feed and shelter them but providing the crucial education their children will need if they are ever to rebuild their shattered country.

But Britain’s commitment to the 0.7% international commitment is also a smart approach for our own country. Working upstream to stop countries falling into costly wars, and preventing humanitarian and migration crises before they get worse, matters to us at home too. We have seen all too clearly that when people feel there is no future for them where they are, then they will do almost anything to get to a place where there is opportunity. ‘Talent is spread everywhere, opportunity isn’t’ is a phrase often used by Ministers but applies to the world as well as to Britain. It’s why we see the levels of migration we do.

If we are to be credible with our aim of a ‘Global Britain’, it means continuing to lead, to take the world’s priorities and make them our own. It is what we have always done as a country – on aid and development, security, climate change and most recently, Covid19, with all the crucial work done on covid vaccines that can save and protect lives across the world.

Breaking from our promise on 0.7% is self-defeating. It just means we leave problems in a wider world until they grow and end up on our doorstep. And it makes it harder for us to persuade other countries that don’t meet their international commitments, for example on aid and defence spending, when we’re backing away from our own. It is of course vital that the aid and development spend we make is well spent, and not given to countries that can look after themselves, but that is well within the gift of Ministers to address.

Britain must lead from the front. If levelling up is a priority at home and it should remain a priority abroad.

Rt Hon Justine Greening

Founder, Social Mobility Pledge

Former Secretary of State for Education, Minister for Women and Equalities, Secretary of State for International Development, Secretary of State for Transport, Economic Secretary to the Treasury