14:30 Tan Dhesi (Labour)

Beyond that, there would be no good or relevant debate without mention of our effort to combat climate change. The debt burden significantly impedes African countries’ abilities to adapt to a changing climate and mitigate the impacts of the climate crisis. As we know, reaching net zero is of critical importance for us all, here and around the world, and I know that the Labour party is doing all it can to acknowledge the impact that the climate crisis is having on African nations.

Sustainable development and climate resilience are urgent needs, yet the debt crisis presents a formidable barrier. I implore the Government to detail collaborative efforts, aligning debt relief with climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies in the countries that I am discussing.

Low-income countries trapped in a debt doom loop cannot access the transformational finance that would allow them to escape from extreme poverty, fight climate change and meet their global goals. So, I urge the Government to share comprehensive strategies for confronting those profound challenges.

In conclusion, the gravity of the African debt crisis necessitates collective action. We must look beyond temporary fixes and address the systemic issues that are at play. I am sure that a future Labour Government will embrace a new approach towards development that is based on respect and a genuine partnership with the global south, which involves supporting its plans to eliminate poverty, tackle climate change and reach the global goals. However, we cannot wait for that future Labour Government; we must act now. So, I implore the current UK Government to act now to address the debt crisis facing African nations.

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14:43 Fleur Anderson (Labour)

I start my contribution by declaring an interest. Before being elected to this place, I was a Jubilee 2000 campaigner back in the 1990s, along with others, and I was then a trustee for the Jubilee Debt Campaign, which is now Debt Justice. As a campaigner for Christian Aid, then for Methodist aid and then for the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development or CAFOD, I led ordinary people in protests up and down the country. Those people all absolutely understood the stranglehold that debt repayments have over so many Governments that would otherwise use that money to educate girls, invest in clean water and sanitation, tackle climate change, and invest in infrastructure such as roads to increase trade and boost the economy.

I also welcome the inclusion of debt in many places in the international White Paper, published yesterday, and agree with its assessment that high and rising debt vulnerability poses a significant development challenge. There needs to be more focus on debt reduction for the world’s most fragile and conflict-risk states. That is vitally linked to climate finance but, again, will there really be the significant action we need to see following that White Paper?

A reported 72% of the sustainable development goals to achieve poverty eradication are off track. According to the UN, they are “woefully off track”, dangerously so. The increasing amount of unsustainable debt is one of the major reasons for that. Many countries were forced to reduce public spending during the pandemic, to keep up with debt payments. That is spending on education, health, water and sanitation. Lower-income countries spend five times more on debt repayment than on addressing the climate crisis.

Countries have had no choice but to turn to fossil fuels to generate the funds needed to meet their colossal debt repayments. I will be at COP28 in a few weeks’ time with a delegation of MPs, and I will make this case to those attending from across the globe. I look to the Government to make the same case and the links. I hope the Minister will say something about the link between debt cancellation and climate finance, which is essential.

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14:50 Jim Shannon (DUP)

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Vickers, and to speak in today’s debate. I thank the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) for leading the debate. We are all here because we have a passion for foreign affairs, and it is great to support him today and I congratulate him on how he has set the scene. It is also a real pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson) for the second time in recent days, as she spoke before me in the COP28 debate last Thursday. I recognise that she has a deep interest and passion, shown through her work with Christian Aid, CAFOD and WaterAid and some of her other projects. I am pleased to follow her in particular because with all that depth of knowledge comes a contribution that makes the debate even more salient and interesting for us. I thank her for that as well.

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15:04 Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)

If we look at the battle against poverty, the battle against poor health, the battle for education, the battle to create the health services and the battle around climate change, we are losing those battles. We are losing them in this generation—at the moment—and we have to change. We have to change in a particular way, because, at some point, we have to make our minds up and say whether we are prepared to create a very different relationship: the indebted no longer as clients of those who hold the debt but, instead, as partners. My hon. Friend the Member for Slough made some very profound points about this.

If we are not a partner to African nations and the people of Africa, we lose battles such as climate change, which is our common battle together. It would be remarkable for Africans to know that we are losing it together, because they make so little contribution to the problems that we have all caused around climate change. African nations as a whole are insignificant at the moment, although an Africa of the future, if not helped through transition to those climate change-consistent policies, will potentially be a major producer of greenhouse gases. We should therefore be partners, but if we are going to be partners, we have to be meaningful about what debt really means.

I will finish with this. Part of that compassion is that we need to restructure debt and increase trade, but we also need to recognise the capacity to ensure that the steward with the single talent really did need assistance to do the things that the hon. Member for Strangford is talking about, to invest wisely. We need to invest in education and in the technologies that can allow us to challenge climate change in Africa as well as here in the UK, in Europe, in China, and even possibly in the post-Trumpian United States of America—who knows? We have to work together, because in the end this is not about simply asking us all to be kind to each other. It is about a common interest of what kind of world we want to live in. Yes, this is a tremendously important debate we are having today. I hope the Minister will begin to respond in a positive way to the issues that my hon. Friend the Member for Slough and others have raised.

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15:17 Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)

It is interesting that whenever the word “justice” is used in the White Paper, it is in the technical, juridical sense relating to a country’s justice systems, rather than in the sense of striving for just, equitable and more peaceful solutions to the challenges that face the modern world. As everybody has said, debt is now one of those biggest challenges. Africa’s debt is at its highest level in over a decade. That is frustrating and disappointing, given all the work and effort that went into setting up the mechanisms for Jubilee 2000 and the Make Poverty History campaign. Progress and huge strides were made for a variety of reasons. Some of those were beyond individual control—such as the likes of the pandemic—but some were very much within our control, such as the way in which multilateral organisations have continued to work, avoidable conflict and, of course, the impact of climate change and the need to respond so quickly, leverage finance and look around to wherever that finance can come from.

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15:28 Ms Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)

Doing our bit to solve the debt crisis is essential to being a good partner to our friends. It affects the UK’s long-term interests. Let me stick with Zambia for a moment: we are talking about a country that is likely to play a massive role in the global green energy transition through its wealth in copper and other critical minerals. By being a positive partner to Zambia, we can demonstrate the serious offer we have to growing countries across Africa and support progress on security, democracy and human rights in the wider southern and central Africa regions.

When it comes to the threats that face us, the biggest is climate heating. Whether Africa makes its green transition in a fair and timely way matters to the UK, as we all live on the same planet, and there is enormous potential to mitigate and adapt to climate change across the continent. However, the funding is not there, and the international development White Paper acknowledges that it cannot all come from international assistance or private sector investment. We have to free up African public funds if climate change is to be tackled in a joined-up, strategic way—the same way we plan to tackle it here in the UK.

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15:40 The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Anne-Marie Trevelyan)

Secondly, we will ensure that key debt management tools are fit for purpose. That includes, for example, updating the IMF’s debt sustainability frameworks to take account of the impact of climate change—obviously, that is a critical element and many colleagues have highlighted it today—and the investments needed to address it and drive the adaptation and resilience programmes that are needed to support countries.

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