Overseas Aid Budget

EDM number 1575 in 1994-95, proposed by George Foulkes on 02/11/1995.

That this House recognises and accepts this country's moral obligation to fight poverty and disadvantage wherever they occur; notes that one-fifth of the developing world's poor go to bed hungry every night, that one quarter have no access to clean drinking water and that one third lives in absolute poverty; notes that nonetheless Britain's overseas aid programme, currently 0.31 per cent. of gross national product and falling still further away from the UN target of 0.7 per cent., is under threat of additional cuts; believes that against such a backdrop of poverty and injustice, any cut to the overseas aid budget would be morally indefensible; and therefore calls on the Government to safeguard the overseas aid budget by rejecting calls for cuts in the forthcoming Financial Statement.

This motion has been signed by a total of 43 MPs.