Anneliese Dodds

I suspect that the hon. Lady has many things to do with her time, and the Labour manifesto for the general election may not be her first priority as bedtime reading, but let me gently encourage her to look at it, because she would see that it does refer to the sustainable development goals. I certainly agree with her that we have not seen the progress that we need to see—I believe we have seen about 17% of the progress that we need to see with the goals to which a target is attached—but the Government are determined to play our part in ensuring that we make faster progress. I have discussed the matter with Amina Mohammed, the deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, on a number of occasions, including last week in Washington. We are determined to work with others to play our part. The hon. Lady asked about the policy of devoting 0.7% of GNI to overseas development assistance. As she will see, that too is in the Labour manifesto; it is our policy when fiscal circumstances allow, and rightly so. She said that in the past the UK had been viewed as an international development superpower, but perhaps it was not today. I have to say that wherever I have been in the world, British people have been engaged in ensuring that we are playing our part as a nation in supporting others. We need to harness that expertise and provide leadership again, and that is exactly what this new Government have been doing. As for the DEC, let me say very briefly that according to my understanding, none of the last few appeals have been fully matched—they have always been pegged at a certain level. I think that is commensurate with how previous DEC appeals have worked, but it may be worth checking that out. I hope that I have covered most of the hon. Lady’s points, for which I am grateful.