Boris Johnson is backing a multi-billion pound cut to the aid budget, but why now? It’s not the first time Johnson has acted like a “medieval pirate whose eye has alighted on this plump Spanish galleon loaded with bullion that he wants to board and plunder it.” That was the description by former Tory development secretary Andrew Mitchell on this morning’s Today programme, before Johnson declared aid should be “spent more in line with Britain’s political, commercial and diplomatic interests.”
Johnson was on the show to talk about the backstop but the reason he was asked about aid was because of the publication of a report written by Tory backbencher Bob Seely. The Henry Jackson Society still haven’t published that report, but I’ve seen the version shown to journalists and on the 0.7 per cent aid commitment, it recommends “giving ourselves the freedom to spend the other 0.2 per cent of GNI on non-economic forms of international development, as defined by the UK.”
- At least 60,000 fewer lives would be saved by immunisation each year
- At least 1 million fewer children would be in education each year
- At least 140,000 fewer people would be saved from modern slavery each year
- At least 40 million fewer people would be treated for tropical diseases each year
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