Independent aid watchdog review backs Committee’s call to limit Government aid spending in the UK

• Read the Report: Aid spending in the UK
• International Development Committee
• Independent Commission for Aid Impact

The Independent Commission for Aid Impact (ICAI) urges Government to consider introducing an upper limit on how much of the UK’s aid budget can be spent by the whole of Government on in-country refugee costs or a minimum level of spending on ODA by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.

The watchdog’s ‘rapid review’ report of UK aid to refugees in the UK is published within weeks of the International Development Committee’s report on Aid spending in the UK which set out how the Home Office in particular has been raiding the FCDO’s aid budget to fund its spend on supporting refugees and asylum seekers in the UK, mainly on hotel accommodation. The Committee called on Government to put the ODA budget beyond the reach of the Home Office and purposely ringfence that budget for the world’s poorest and most vulnerable countries.

Chair's comment

The Chair of the International Development Committee, Sarah Champion MP, said: 

“ICAI’s Rapid Review reaffirms our own convictions that the FCDO needs help to safeguard the aid budget and say ‘no’ to the Home Office’s continued profligate spending of it. This Review confirms that our valuable aid budget is being squandered as a result of Home Office failure to get on top of asylum application backlogs and keep control of the costs of asylum accommodation and support contracts. While there are no limits on spending, there is no incentive for the Home Office to seek value for money or check its spending: the Home Office is a department out of control.

“ICAI estimates that core UK expenditure on in-country refugee costs was around £3.5 billion in 2022, approximately one third of the UK’s total aid spend that year. As a result, the FCDO had to pause all but essential aid, meaning critical programmes have had to be cut or put on hold. It is time for the UK Government to get a grip on Home Office spending of the aid budget so that we can return to the real spirit of aid spending- spending that should promote and target the economic development and welfare of developing countries.”

Further information

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