Beccy Cooper MP: speeches

Speeches

• 7 Jul 2026 · UK Aid Policy: Global Funding Trends · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. We meet at a moment when the global aid system is under extraordinary pressure. I thank the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) for securing this incredibly important debate. Current projections suggest that cuts to international aid could contribute to as many as 14 million additional deaths by 2030, including 4.5 million children under the age of five. That is the human cost of dismantling the world aid architecture at speed. The United Kingdom is not alone in reducing aid spending—the United States, France, Germany and Canada are all scaling back their commitments—but that does not make our choices less significant; it makes them more significant. When every major donor retreats at the same time, there is no one left to step into the gap, and yet the challenges we face today do not stop at national borders. Conflict, climate change, forced displacement, pandemics and antimicrobial resistance affect us all. Investment overseas is increasingly an investment in our own security and prosperity here at home. Global health provides perhaps the clearest example of why this matters. Viruses do not stop at passport control. The first line of defence against the next pandemic is not at Heathrow or Dover, it is in strong public health systems thousands of miles away. Our national health service and the health security of people across Britain depend on a global health system that works effectively for everyone. That is why I welcome aspects of the Government’s approach. I welcome the decision to provide protection for key multilateral health organisations, and I am proud that the UK has made ambitious commitments to the Global Fund and to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance—institutions with a proven ability to deliver vaccines at scale and to reach communities that fragmented programmes often cannot. The Government are also right to recognise that countries want autonomy, not dependency, and that our role should be to help to build resilient health systems that countries themselves can sustain and own. That is the right long-term objective.