UK cuts foreign aid budget as COVID-19 hits finances

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Britain's government on Wednesday unveiled plans to slash the foreign aid budget to help mend its coronavirus-battered finances, defying calls ...

Chancellor Rishi Sunak said the UK would raise aid spending again 'when the fiscal situation allows' AFP/-LONDON: Britain's government on Wednesday unveiled plans to slash the foreign aid budget to help mend its coronavirus-battered finances, defying calls from high-profile figures to protect the world's poorest people.

The aid budget would return to 0.7 per cent of national income"when the fiscal situation allows", he said. Prime Minister Boris Johnson last week announced Britain's biggest programme of military investment since the end of the Cold War with extra spending of £16.5 billion, as the country positions itself for a post-EU future.

David Cameron, whose coalition government anchored the 0.7 per cent target in law, said abandoning it would be a"moral, strategic and political mistake". The plan could face trouble when it comes up for a vote in the House of Commons, with opposition parties united against the cut and some leading Conservatives also voicing concern.

 

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