To ask His Majesty's Government, in the light of the announcement that overseas aid spending will be reduced to 0.3 per cent of gross national income (GNI) from 2027, what percentage of GNI will be spent on (1) overseas projects and (2) projects on gender, once the costs of housing refugees have been taken into account.
Answered on
29 April 2025
The Government is committed to ensuring that asylum costs fall and has already acted. The Government has taken measures to reduce the asylum backlog, reform the asylum accommodation system to end the use of expensive accommodation in the next Spending Review (SR) period and increase detention capacity to facilitate more asylum removals. Whilst there will always be volatility in asylum forecasts, we expect these decisions to drive down overall in-donor refugee costs over the next SR.
All UK Official Development Assistance (ODA) spending is consistent with the international rules agreed by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's Development Assistance Committee. This includes ODA spent on in-donor refugee costs.
Decisions on how the ODA budget will be used will be worked through as part of the ongoing Spending Review, based on various factors including impact assessments. The UK is committed to empowering women and girls around the world through our international work.