Overseas Development

Part of Prayers – in the House of Commons at 11:46 pm on 14 December 1990.

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Photo of Mr David Steel Mr David Steel , Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale 11:46, 14 December 1990

It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr. Wells) in these debates. I have always regarded him as one of a small minority of Conservative Members who speak with great knowledge and genuine concern on this subject. In particular, I agree with him about the excellent programme organised by our embassy in South Africa which I have seen. He will agree that some of the structural lessons from it do not apply to conditions other than those in South Africa. Would that they did. However, he is right that there are some lessons to be learnt from the effective nature of that modest but invaluable programme.

Before I turn to the main subject of today's debate, I wish to pick up what the Minister said about the famine in the Horn. There is a sense of public disquiet, nay outrage, that four or five years after the great emotional public response to the famine in Ethiopia, we should again ask people to dip into their pockets. It is not that they are reluctant to do so again, but they are asking what we have done since that great appeal to put right the situation in that and other parts of Africa. I have two suggestions to make to the Government.

First, as the Minister said, civil war exacerbates conditions of famine. That is true not just of Ethiopia, but of Mozambique, Angola and other countries. Those wars would not continue if we could starve the countries of their supply of arms. Now that we have a politically more effective United Nations organisation, it is time to revive the proposal of Hans Dietrich Genscher, the German Foreign Minister, for a United Nations-organised, international arms sales register. We in the west cannot continue to allow our private companies to profit from massive arms sales to all parts of the world and then wring our hands when civil wars continue. I should like the Government as a matter of policy to take action in the United Nations to stop the supply of arms to those areas, so that resources that are wasted on armaments may be put to peaceful uses. The figures are appalling. In the past few years the Governments of developing countries have spent double on arms what they have spent on health and education. We cannot be surprised that tragedies such as that in Ethiopia continue year after year while some people profit from the arms trade. The Government should make that issue a priority in their mission in the United Nations.

I do not know of the experience of other hon. Members, but I am struck by the number of young people in our country who want to find an outlet for their idealism and energy through service in the third world. Although the Government support Voluntary Services Overseas, it is aiming to increase its volunteers to a modest 1,500 next year. We should return to the spirit that was prevalent in the mid-1960s in Britain and America. Then there was a great well of organised support and qualified young people to go out to help the third world. Such voluntary work is cost-effective. People are willing to increase knowledge about the growing of crops, and organise irrigation schemes, engineering works, water supplies, immunisation programmes and family planning programmes. We should do a great deal more to harness the desire of so many people to undertake such voluntary work. Official Government-to-Government programmes are welcome, but voluntary assistance has a great role to play.

This debate is welcome, despite its thin attendance. It is held against the continuing background of the disproportionate allocation of resources and population on the globe. One quarter of the world's population lives in the rich north and we enjoy four fifths of the world's income —three quarters of the world's population lives in the poor south and they are saddled with just one fifth of the world's income.

The Minister gave us the now-familiar figures of projections for population growth. Since 1950 the population has doubled and it is forecast to double again by the middle of next century. The Minister will also be aware, however, of more authoritative and gloomy reports, and I am glad that the hon. Member for Devizes (Sir C. Morrison) devoted his speech to that important topic. He quoted from the report of United Nations Fund for Population Activities, which said: The next 10 years will decide the shape of the 21st century. They may decide the future of the earth as a habitation for humans. If we took those words seriously the Chamber would be full today as we tried to tackle the problem. Unfortunately, the global population explosion and its link to threats to the world environment is far more serious than our people and the general political debate appreciate.

We have already heard that the developing countries have enough problems providing for their current populations, let alone trying to tackle the problems caused by substantially increased ones. The environmental consequences of a failure to tackle the population explosion will result in problems relating to food, fuel, water and land supplies as poorer countries make a desperate attempt to provide for their unacceptably increasing populations.

This country has a responsibility to lead on population and environmental issues. Last year Britain hosted the conference that agreed to phase out all CFC emissions from the European Community by the end of this century. I was disappointed, however, that we did not back the German and Danish Governments who were pressing for earlier targets. We are a little complacent about the scale of the destruction of the ozone layer which we shall allow to continue through the next decade. The fact is that 80 per cent. of greenhouse gases originate in the developed countries and, therefore, the responsibility lies with us to make a greater effort to reduce those emissions.

Just as the new political muscle of the UN should be used to control arms sales, so we should beef up the United Nations Environment Programme to make it the appropriate body to administer an international global climate fund to monitor and enforce CO2 reductions. It should co-ordinate the necessary international action to achieve that. For that to happen, however, UNEP must be given greater political and financial backing.

I do not want to make a long speech, but I must take issue with the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford who said that we should be proud of our aid budget. When I visit schools I discover that the one thing that is fixed in people's minds is that, many years ago, the UN agreed that we should aim to devote 0·7 per cent. of our gross national product to overseas aid. People may not know much about overseas development, but that target figure is firmly in their minds. During the lifetime of the Government, we have never reached that target. The Select Committee on Foreign Affairs has called on the Government to set a timetable for achieving that target, but it has not materialised; nor have we had an acceptance of that target in principle.