Anneliese Dodds

I have enormous respect for the Chair of the International Development Committee and I have had a lot of discussions with her and other members of the Committee on this subject. The decision to count in-donor refugee costs within the overall category of overseas development assistance is, of course, a statistical decision taken by the OECD. Different countries have had far lower levels of overseas development assistance going into those in-donor refugee costs. They have not seen the untrammelled increases that we saw under previous Governments. As I said, the current UK Government are determined to have a longer-term approach to the issue, and to get the costs down. In fact we have been doing so, as has been reflected in the decision taken by the Chief Secretary of the Treasury to increase the yearly ODA just after the new year. Part of that was from the reduction in in-donor refugee costs. It is a priority for the Home Secretary and the whole Government to ensure that we are dealing with those issues, so I am grateful to him for raising that point. We are investing to make systems for education more resilient. At COP28 in Dubai, the UK helped to launch a new global declaration on the common agenda for education and climate change, through which 90 countries have now committed to action on climate that helps protect education. Ahead of COP30 in Brazil this year, we are working with our partners to prioritise the role of education in combating the climate and nature crises and to secure further action to protect children, including when they are learning, from extreme weather. In response to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Alice Macdonald), who is no longer in her place, I should say that she is right to underline the relationship between education, water and sanitation. That is important because children should be able to do something as basic as go to the toilet when they are at school; it is particularly important when it comes to girls’ education, because when there is not access to water that poses a particular problem for menstruating girls. When it comes to resilience, we must ensure that we join up the UK’s strength in artificial intelligence and education technology, and harness their power responsibly so we can support marginalised children, tailor learning to students’ needs and boost the capacity of teachers, enabling them to reach children who cannot join them in the classroom. We are determined to ensure that more children can gain the skills they need to make the leap into higher and further education and employment. Once again, many thanks to all Members who have taken part in the debate. It has been an incredibly important one, and I look forward to the closing remarks.