ActionAid’s Head of Policy, Dr Claire Melamed said:

“ActionAid is delighted that the Conservatives have maintained their commitment to aid spending, at a time when all parties are agonising over likely budget cuts.  In these straitened times, the need to demonstrate the benefits of aid has also encouraged the Conservatives to propose adopting some of the approaches to making aid accountable to poor people that ActionAid has been pioneering for many years.

"The history of development is littered with proposals that looked good on paper but turned out to be an administrative nightmare and to undermine the very thing they sought to achieve.  ActionAid remains concerned that the proposals in this paper for aid vouchers and payment by results will turn out to yet another of the well-meaning but ultimately damaging experiments that can blight the lives of the poor."

ActionAid’s key points are:

On aid
1.    ActionAid welcomes the acknowledgement that much aid is life-changing and that David Cameron and Andrew Mitchell are committed to maintaining progress towards spending 0.7% of the UK’s national income on international aid by the 2013 target.

2.    ActionAid remains to be convinced about the merits of a voucher approach to aid and payment by results. We are concerned that the administrative burden and cost of a voucher system would detract scarce resources from other more efficient ways of making aid more accountable and more effective. There is a danger that payment by results could skew government priorities towards short term and unsustainable delivery rather than building the institutions that are vital for development to be successful in the long run.

On accountability
3.    The emphasis on quality and effectiveness and on ensuing aid is accountable to the people who need it most is highly commendable. Aid should be spent well. This is an issue ActionAid has campaigning on for several years through its “real aid” work. Likewise ActionAid has pioneered approaches in which poor communities can monitor how local governments spend their money. In Ethiopia, ActionAid has been working on a local government monitoring project since 2007 which has allowed more than 1000 people to directly raise their concerns about how local services were being provided, and which resulted in long term changes to how services were provided and to more than 15 local government officials being sacked for poor performance.

Omissions
However challenges remain. The Green Paper is an excellent starting point for discussion but ActionAid has grave concerns over some of the suggestions in the report and some of the omissions.

a.    In its desire for an increased role for the private sector in development the Green Paper overlooks the role that governments need to play in ensuring that the private sector makes the fullest possible contribution to development. For example it is essential that companies investing in developing countries pay all the taxes owed and do not seek to evade their obligations by using tax havens and opaque banking practices.

b.    The Green Paper fails to properly address the fact that poverty has an overwhelmingly female face. Without due attention to the role of women in all sectors - as business people, as farmers and not just as mothers - development will not be achieved.  


ENDS

Further information from Tony Durham or Jane Moyo in the media team on 020 7561 7614 or 07734 023347