Member News
15th May 2012Child poverty campaigner has a stark response to those who call for the UK to spend less on aid, because the country is in recession.
"The children living in poverty around the world can't wait for our economy to improve - for them aid means the difference between life and death.
"As to whether we can afford it or not, the government has long promised not to balance the books on the backs of the world's poorest, I think that is commendable and it is also morally right that we are doing this."
Amy Whalley, UNICEF UK's International Policy and Parliamentary Manager, lobbies for children's rights.
"I have worked for UNICEF for three years and have worked in the sector for about ten years," she says.
"Being able to make a difference to the lives of some of the poorest people around the world is what really drew me to international development. The UK has long been a leader in international development so it is a privilege to work in a way that influences and discuss such an important issue with a government that takes it so seriously."
The development sector had been hoping for a bill in last week's Queen's Speech putting the coalition's pledge to spend 0.7% of GDP on overseas aid, but no legislation was announced.
Ms Whalley said that the government has missed an opportunity to "send a signal that Britain is going to keep its word to the world's poorest children by making it legally binding".
"We were really pleased to see the government reiterating its promise to spend 0.7% of national income on aid by 2013. Our position is that aid makes a massive difference to children. Around four million fewer children are going to die this year and about 33 million have already had the chance to go to school for the first time as a result.
"We think it is vital the government lives up to its promise to legislate, which was in the coalition agreement. There is general cross-party agreement to put 0.7% into law as soon as possible."
Ms Whalley says that despite positive outcomes, "around 8.8 million children don't get to see their fifth birthday - that is an incredible number".
"In a world where there are still massive inequalities there is no doubt that we keep to keep to this long-standing promise. The 0.7% promise is about 40 years old now.
"Aid is still a very small portion for government spending it is good to keep that in perspective."
UNICEF's relationship with the UN means it has a truly global reach, with projects in 190 countries.
"Unicef UK is the national committee of Unicef," Ms Whalley explains.
"We are a charity based in the UK. UNICEF globally receives no direct funding from the UN budget, so it raises all its money from voluntary contributions.
"Our central tenet is every child should have all their rights met under the UN convention on the rights of the child."
That work includes children at home as well as abroad.
"The biggest challenge in the UK is child poverty; we still have very high rates. Similar to poverty around the world, it has a massive impact on children's lives. The development that happens when you are a child means that any rights violations when you are young stay with you for the rest of your life."
UNICEF comes into greater public attention with its work on natural disasters such as famines and droughts.
"The work we did last year on the East Africa famine, which is still going on, was during an incredibly difficult time for children and all the people in Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia," Ms Whalley recalls.
"It really is a situation we should not be seeing in 2012. We also last year did some work around trying to get the government to commit to providing long-term money for climate change, to help fund adaptation programmes and activities in developing countries. We need to help them cope with the impact of climate change, which a lot of countries are already feeling."
UNICEF is hosting an event later today, chaired by Lord Ashdown, on aid.
"We are co-hosting with Save the Children UK. The idea is to have an open discussion about the importance of aid and the importance that British aid spending makes to children all around the world."
UNICEF is also raising the situation in the food situation in West Africa, which Ms Whalley describes as "increasingly tenuous and difficult".
"In areas like Niger, Mauritania and Chad there are over one million children suffering from severe and acute malnutrition - in Niger alone it is over 400,000 children.
"We are doing quite a lot of work raising that up the media agenda because we don't want a repeat of what happened in East Africa last year. If we take action now we can avoid it."