Written question asked by Gregory Campbell (Democratic Unionist Party) on Friday, 7 December 2018, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 12 December 2018 (named day). It was answered by Harriett Baldwin (Conservative) on Wednesday, 12 December 2018 on behalf of the Department for International Development.

Overseas Aid

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what assessment her Department has made of the effect of UK Official development Assistance on low income countries in each of the last five years.

Answer: For each of the last five years the impact of DFID’s work has been set out in the Departmental Annual Reports and Accounts. The DFID Annual Report and Accounts 2017-2018 also shows the results achieved during the period April 2015 to March 2018. In that period, UK Official Development Assistance reached 26.8 million people with humanitarian assistance and supported 40.3 million people to access clean water and/or better sanitation. Between January 2015 and December 2017, it supported the immunisation of approximately 37.4 million children, saving an estimated 610,000 lives. We are committed to improving the effectiveness and transparency of UK aid to ensure we are attaining maximum impact from our aid budget. The Independent Commission for Aid Impact (ICAI) has the remit to provide independent scrutiny of the impact and value for money of all UK Government aid spending and reports its finding to Parliament’s International Development Committee.

Secondary information