Ian Ellis: The merger of the Department of International Development into the Foreign Office has caused much concern

The new department is to be known as ‘the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’.

Mr Johnson, addressing the House of Commons, said that currently “a dividing line between aid and foreign policy runs through our whole system”, with DFID working independently of the Foreign Office and outspending the Foreign Office “more than four times over “.

Although he acknowledged that DFID had “amassed world class expertise”, he said that “no single decision-maker in either department is able to unite our efforts or take a comprehensive overview”.

Pointing out that the current arrangements date back to 1997 when they were “right for their time”, he questioned whether they were fit for today’s purpose when the economic balance in the world has changed, most notably with regard to China’s growth.

Under the new arrangements, the foreign secretary will decide which countries receive, or cease to receive, British aid, Mr Johnson said, but it is precisely a linking of aid with foreign policy that has caused unease not least among a string of UK aid charities.

Moreover, no fewer than three former prime ministers have voiced criticisms of Mr Johnson’s announcement, with David Cameron tweeting that it would lead to “less expertise, less voice for development at the top table and ultimately less respect for the UK overseas”.

Former Labour prime ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown also weighed in rejecting the move.

It would be deplorable if national efforts to relieve suffering in the world were essentially to become bargaining tools in the arena of international political interests.

There has to be a higher motive than power play when it comes to helping our neighbours either at home or in distant lands.

So, responding to the DFID-Foreign Office merger, Christian world development charity Tearfund issued a statement saying that the move “dismantles the UK’s leadership on international development” and “suggests we are turning our backs on the world’s poorest people, as well as some of the greatest global challenges of our time: coronavirus, extreme poverty, climate change and conflict”.

Tearfund declared that UK aid now “risks becoming a vehicle for UK foreign policy, commercial and political objectives, when it first and foremost should be invested to alleviate poverty”.

Nigel Harris, Tearfund’s CEO, added that the move “comes at a time when it is crucial that the UK does not turn its back on the world’s poorest when we are fighting a global pandemic that will hit those most vulnerable and with the least social protection and healthcare hardest”.

Patrick Watt, Christian Aid’s director of policy, public affairs and campaigns, went so far as to label the merger “an act of political vandalism”.

Presbyterian Church in Ireland moderator Dr David Bruce, as reported by this newspaper, has written to the prime minister expressing similar concerns.

But it was former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the current chair of Christian Aid, who, when asked by the BBC to give his verdict on the merger decision, gave the most curt reply when he simply said that it was “incomprehensible”.

He drew attention to contradictory messages from the prime minister who had both praised DFID’s spending effectiveness as well as claiming that people had been treating it as “a cashpoint in the sky”.

Lord Williams countered that projects which DFID shares with non-governmental organisations such as Christian Aid are closely monitored and assessed in terms of their effectiveness.

He asked what the problem is that the DFID-Foreign Office merger move is meant to solve.

Responding to Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab’s earlier comments that the move was intended to bring British aid and development expertise to the “beating heart” of foreign policy, the former archbishop said that evidence was needed to show that DFID would be better if merged with the Foreign Office.

While accepting that “aid is always a form of soft power”, Lord Williams was concerned that it was now going to be “instrumentalised” into short-term diplomatic gains and in the pursuit of geopolitical interests.

Rowan Williams’ comments reminded me of an interview I conducted with him for The Church of Ireland Gazette back in 2014 in which he stressed the way in which Christian Aid strategically stresses long-term issues.

The extent to which development and emergency relief aid is linked to a donor country’s political interests is a legitimate question but it is important to keep the clear purpose of aid in mind, that is, the relief of human suffering and deprivation.

It is axiomatic that foreign aid is a foreign engagement but it should be led first and foremost by human need rather than by political interest, which has not been unknown at times to have come under the influence of commercial lobbying.

The very people who are deprived of medical services, shelter or food are not political players or ideologues.

They are powerless individuals and they look to wealthy nations to come to their assistance.

• Canon Ian Ellis is a former editor of The Church of Ireland Gazette

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