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G8 and G20 Summits

My Lords, I was going to say how grateful I was that the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, was standing in for the leader of the Opposition. Having heard his speech, I am not sure that that is the case. He asked a series of extremely pertinent questions that, if this were a full debate of several hours, would take me tens of minutes to reply to. I hope that he will forgive me if on some of his specific questions I answer him by way of a letter. As I know that others in the House will take what the noble Lord said seriously and with great interest, I will make sure that a copy of the letter is put in the Library. The noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, started off with an important question about the statement by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister on Afghanistan, the so-called five-year limit and whether any discussions took place with our allies. We are in a state of continual consultation with our allies in Afghanistan. None of that statement was a surprise to them. They understood exactly the point that we were making. There is no desire in any country for its forces to remain in Afghanistan for any longer than they absolutely have to. Over the past few weeks, we have laid out a set of priorities that we believe will enable British forces to have largely removed from Afghanistan, as part of getting civil society in Afghanistan working again. We have set ourselves new priorities on the aim of development aid. It is right that we and the G8 should do so. It is important continually to review our processes and priorities for our development goals, and the new priorities on the health of mothers, children and families speak for themselves. However, a unity of purpose does not mean a unity of means. Although it is true that Britain has maintained its commitment on funding overseas aid, other countries have found it more difficult. However, in the medium term, there is no reason why we should not get back to the original position. We do not anticipate new money coming in to deal with those priorities. It will be a change of priorities within the existing budget but, as we have explained, over time we hope to meet our target of 0.7 per cent of GDP. On bank levies and the financial situation, as the noble Lord knows only too well, the IMF forecasts that the UK will in 2010-11 have the largest budget deficit in the G7. When he talked about the record of the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, I was not quite sure whether he took pride in the legacy that the Labour Party left this country. We must never lose sight of the lesson of the past three years: taxpayers pick up the bill not only when one of our banks fails but when Governments spend too much money. The bank levy, the concentration of risks and higher capital requirements will all be debated and discussed as quickly as possible over the next few months. There is no question of the new bank rules being imposed. They will need to be agreed by all, and we believe that there is every possibility of those new rules being agreed by everybody. The noble Lord poked fun at my coalition colleagues, which was entirely unnecessary. I can confirm to him that we are getting along extremely well. Sometimes people say that we have a lot to learn from our European colleagues. I hope that when it comes to working with coalition colleagues, they will find that they have a lot to learn from us.