The government has admitted that slashing foreign aid spending will likely see global deaths rise – as it confirmed the cuts will fall disproportionately on women and girls’ education and on projects across Africa.
Its own assessment of the cuts’ impact said: “Any reductions to health spending risk an increase in disease burden and ultimately in deaths, impacting in particular those living in poverty, women, children and people with disabilities.”
The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) has set out cuts of £575 million in 2025 to 2026, The government is cutting aid spending by 40 per cent in total, from 0.5 per cent to 0.3 per cent of Gross National Income by 2027. That is around £6 billion, meaning the deepest cuts are still to come.
Spending on health overall is set to drop by 46 per cent from £975 million to £527m in 2025/26. This includes health security – the type of work designed to prevent future pandemics. The pot also includes sexual and reproductive health and the Ending Preventable Deaths Support Programme, designed to stop avoidable deaths of women, newborns and children. Both face cuts as yet undefined.
Spending on education, gender and equality will fall by 42 per cent, or £200 million, with girls’ education funding specifically almost halving to £186m. That includes the closure of a girls’ education programme in Democratic Republic of Congo which the government said would have “negative impacts on 170,000 children” in post-conflict rural areas.
Spending in Africa overall will fall from £1.6bn to £1.4bn, while spending in Europe will rise slightly.
“The world’s most marginalised communities, particularly those experiencing conflict and women and girls, will pay the highest price for these political choices,” said Gideon Rabinowitz, Director of Policy and Advocacy at Bond, the UK network for international development organisations. “At a time when the US has gutted all gender programming, the UK should be stepping up, not stepping back.”
Sarah Champion, the Labour MP who chairs the Commons International Development Committee, said the changes “will hurt education, health, social protection and support for women and girls” which she described as “the pillars of healthy and secure societies”.
And Andrew Mitchell, the former deputy foreign secretary, said: “The fact that a Labour government has made these cuts which will undoubtedly lead to numerous deaths amongst very vulnerable people is an affront to the internationalist reputation of the Labour Party and will do huge damage to the UK’s reputation as a reliable development leader in the poorest parts of the world.”
The FCDO report confirmed the UK will send £1.8bn to the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA) – providing grants and low-interest loans to low-income countries – in part of a shift in funding towards big multi-country spending programmes including the global vaccine alliance Gavi. This means less money going from the UK directly to projects in specific countries.
“Despite making cuts of roughly half a billion pounds, it’s encouraging to see that the government is prioritising multilateral spend and honouring its pledge to the World Bank. Yet, it is unfortunate that Africa – home to over two-thirds of those in extreme poverty – will receive under half of FCDO’s country and regional budget,” said Ian Mitchell, a senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Development.
“If the government is to achieve its manifesto mission to tackle poverty, it will need to focus its budget where poverty exists and give African countries greater priority in its subsequent allocations,” he added.
Mr Rabinowitz said while he welcomed the consistent funding for certain humanitarian crises, vaccines and the World Bank, “it is clear that the government is deprioritising funding for education, gender and countries experiencing humanitarian crises such as South Sudan, Ethiopia and Somalia.”
While the government has committed to protecting spending for Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine, other crisis-hit countries face significant cuts.
The plans also see a halving in spending on girls’ education as well as reductions in spending on women’s health, including sexual and reproductive health, and health emergencies.
ActionAid UK co-CEO Hannah Bond said she was, “deeply alarmed by plans to slash girls’ education funding. This will almost inevitably push more girls out of school and into forced child marriages, denying them their rights and choices.”
While some humanitarian spending is being prioritised, Ms Bond added that slashing funding to women-led organisations working on peace and security would cut what is, “often the only lifeline for those facing violence, hunger, and displacement and calling out violations of human rights abuses,” including in Gaza and Ukraine.
Leading charities have previously raised the alarm that programmes supporting girls and women would be in the firing line.
The UK has been a leader in funding sexual and reproductive health including family planning, and the withdrawal of the US from funding these services has left a huge gap. It remains to be seen whether key programmes increasing access to contraception around the world like the Women’s Integrated Sexual Health (WISH) initiative will be protected.
While the government’s own impact assessment makes it clear that, where cuts fall, they will negative impacts on equality, the report claimed overall spending demonstrated, “disproportionate impacts on equalities have been avoided”.
Minister for Development Baroness Jenny Chapman said: “We are modernising our approach to international development. Every pound must work harder for UK taxpayers and the people we help around the world and these figures show how we are starting to do just that through having a clear focus and priorities.
“The UK is moving towards a new relationship with developing countries, becoming partners and investors, rather than acting as a traditional aid donor. We want to work with countries and share our expertise – from world leading science to the City of London – to help them become no longer dependent on aid, and organisations like the World Bank and Gavi are central to how we can work with others to solve some of the biggest challenges of our time: humanitarian disasters, pandemics and the climate crisis.”
More details on where further cuts will fall are expected later in the year.
This article was produced as part of The Independent’s Rethinking Global Aid project
