House of Commons - International Development Committee: Implications for Development in the Event of Scotland Becoming and Independent Country - HC 692 PDF Download
Are you looking for read ebook online? Search for your book and save it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Download House of Commons - International Development Committee: Implications for Development in the Event of Scotland Becoming and Independent Country - HC 692 PDF full book. Access full book title House of Commons - International Development Committee: Implications for Development in the Event of Scotland Becoming and Independent Country - HC 692 by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: International Development Committee. Download full books in PDF and EPUB format.
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: International Development Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780215065865
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 68
Get Book Here
Book Description
The UK's aid programme, much of which is delivered from Scotland, is genuinely transformational. The UK provided £8.7 billion of aid in 2012/13, but it is the quality of this aid - not just its quantity - which sets the UK apart. As part of the UK, Scotland makes a tremendous contribution to all this. If Scotland were to become an independent country, its development agency would inevitably be a much smaller player. From 2013 onwards, the UK Government plans to spend 0.7% of Gross National Income on Official Development Assistance. If Scotland were to become independent, the UK's overall GNI - and the amount of money it spends on ODA - would fall. "Scotland has 8.3% of the UK's population share, so we estimate that the UK's ODA would fall by around 8.3%, or £1 billion. DFID's work - either its bilateral programmes or its funding to multilateral organisations - would inevitably then be subject to cuts. MPs are also concerned that during any transitional period, the restructuring of DFID and the setup of an independent Scottish development agency would divert management attention towards restructuring and away from frontline delivery by both agencies. In addition, a significant proportion of DFID's workforce is based at its Scottish office in East Kilbride, including a number of senior staff. By contrast, the number of jobs available with an independent Scottish development agency is likely to be relatively few (or the new Scottish development agency would be heavily overstaffed). The impact on jobs would therefore be substantial.
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: International Development Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780215065865
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 68
Get Book Here
Book Description
The UK's aid programme, much of which is delivered from Scotland, is genuinely transformational. The UK provided £8.7 billion of aid in 2012/13, but it is the quality of this aid - not just its quantity - which sets the UK apart. As part of the UK, Scotland makes a tremendous contribution to all this. If Scotland were to become an independent country, its development agency would inevitably be a much smaller player. From 2013 onwards, the UK Government plans to spend 0.7% of Gross National Income on Official Development Assistance. If Scotland were to become independent, the UK's overall GNI - and the amount of money it spends on ODA - would fall. "Scotland has 8.3% of the UK's population share, so we estimate that the UK's ODA would fall by around 8.3%, or £1 billion. DFID's work - either its bilateral programmes or its funding to multilateral organisations - would inevitably then be subject to cuts. MPs are also concerned that during any transitional period, the restructuring of DFID and the setup of an independent Scottish development agency would divert management attention towards restructuring and away from frontline delivery by both agencies. In addition, a significant proportion of DFID's workforce is based at its Scottish office in East Kilbride, including a number of senior staff. By contrast, the number of jobs available with an independent Scottish development agency is likely to be relatively few (or the new Scottish development agency would be heavily overstaffed). The impact on jobs would therefore be substantial.
Author: Stephen Gethins
Publisher: Luath Press Ltd
ISBN: 1910022519
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 275
Get Book Here
Book Description
Scotland has a distinctive place in the world. Nation to Nation explores how this unique relationship with the rest of the world has developed over the years and how it manifests itself today. In this book Stephen Gethins combines his knowledge from years of work in the field - from the conflict zones of the former Soviet Union to the corridors of power in Westminster and Brussels - with insights from political, cultural and academic figures who have been at the heart of foreign policy in Scotland, the UK, Europe and North America. Gethins looks at Scotland's foreign policy to better inform the debate about our country's future and its relationships with its neighbours near and far.
Author: Great Britain: Scotland Office
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780101855426
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 114
Get Book Here
Book Description
The UK Government is undertaking a major cross-government programme of analysis prior to the referendum on Scottish independence in 2014. The aim is to provide a comprehensive and detailed analysis of Scotland's place in the UK. This paper, the first of a series to be published in 2013 and 2014, examines the UK's constitutional set-up and the legal implications of independence. The UK Government is convinced that the current devolution offers the best for Scotland: the Scottish Parliament and Government are empowered to take decisions on a range of domestic policy areas - such as health, education, policing - while Scotland continues to benefit from decisions made for the UK as a whole - defence and security, foreign representation, economic affairs. Independence is very different to devolution. Based on independent expert opinion (published as Annex A), the paper concludes that if there were to be a vote in favour of leaving the UK, Scotland would become an entirely new state whilst the remainder of the UK would continue as before, retaining the rights and obligations of the UK as it currently stands. Any separation would have to be negotiated between both governments. Legal and practical implications of independence, both at home and abroad, are addressed. An independent Scotland would have to apply to and/or negotiate to become a member of whichever international organisations it wished to join, including the EU and NATO. Scotland would also have to work through its positions on thousands of international treaties to which the UK is currently party.
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Foreign Affairs Committee
Publisher: Stationery Office
ISBN: 9780215057235
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 186
Get Book Here
Book Description
With just over sixteen months to go before the Scottish referendum there are still significant gaps in the Scottish Government's proposed foreign policy, according to a report published today by the Foreign Affairs Committee. There has not been enough analysis on what sort of overseas diplomatic network and external security and intelligence provision Scotland would have to set up. There needs to be a more realistic assessment of the extent to which Scotland could expect the rest of the UK (RUK) to co-operate with, and support it, on security and intelligence. There is a pressing need for official legal advice on a wide range of international legal issues including EU accession, EU opt-outs and membership of international organisations. The Report says that the overwhelming body of law, evidence, practice and precedent supports the view that the RUK would inherit the vast majority of the UK's international rights and obligations whereas Scotland would start anew internationally if it became independent. Having two co-equal states could lead to a level of legal and political insecurity that would not be tolerated by other states. The report disputes the view that Scotland's journey towards membership of the EU and NATO would be straightforward. It is for the EU itself to determine in accordance with its regulations whether and how Scotland would become a member. Scotland may have to make trade-offs to secure the unanimous support it would need from within the EU.
Author: Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. International Development Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0215085736
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 25
Get Book Here
Book Description
As the end of the 2010-2015 Parliament approaches, the Committee has taken the opportunity to look back on their work. This Report outlines some of the Committee's work, progress and effectiveness during this Parliament and sets out areas that may be of interest to their successor committee. It has also provided the opportunity to scrutinise what actions the Government has taken with regard to issues and recommendations raised in our reports.
Author: Charlie Jeffery
Publisher: Birlinn
ISBN: 1870482999
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 162
Get Book Here
Book Description
Should Scotland be an independent country? Choosing an answer to that question, as Scotland's electors will on 18 September 2014, is a choice of huge significance. So how will we come to a decision? Many voters know more or less by instinct. Plenty of us are convinced that being independent is right and good for our country and not being independent is wrong. Plenty of others believe the opposite: that what is right and good is staying as part of the UK. But there are more still - probably the biggest single group - who don't have such conviction either way and are puzzling their way through what voting Yes or No might mean for them and their families. This book is for them. We have taken sixteen questions, which seem to us to be central to the referendum debate, and asked impartial experts to look at them. We do not aim to provide definitive answers - and we certainly do not intend to tell anyone how to vote - but rather to enable readers to better judge the claims that are made by either side.
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: International Development Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0215075854
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 32
Get Book Here
Book Description
The Independent Commission on Aid Impact (ICAI) is an independent commission which reports to the House of Commons International Development Committee, not to the Department for International Development (DFID). The Committee ensures its accountability to Parliament in two main ways: through a sub-Committee, which takes evidence on the reports published by ICAI; and through an inquiry each year carried out by the full Committee into ICAI's Annual Report. 2013-14 has been a busy year for ICAI, with 12 reports published on a wide range of DFID's activities. ICAI's Annual Report contained three headline findings for DFID this year. Firstly, tighter management of multilateral partners is needed. Secondly, DFID needs to continue to improve its aid programme management capacity, especially where contractors are implementing programmes. Thirdly, DFID's corporate results agenda - and in particular its use of 'reach indicators' - is distorting programming choices. The Committee shares ICAI's concerns on these issues and intend to follow up its recommendations in two forthcoming inquiries this autumn: Beyond Aid; and DFID's Departmental Annual Report 2013-14. DFID spends a large amount of money - at least £200 million - on self-evaluation. However, it cannot provide an exact total. The Committee question this large expenditure, especially given that an ICAI evaluation recently found that DFID staff struggle to use self-evaluation material in their work. The contracts of the current ICAI commissioners, contractor consortium and staff all end in May 2015. While staff contracts may be renewed, new commissioners and contractors must be recruited. Planning is underway for the transition to the next phase of ICAI: all possible efforts must be made to ensure this goes as smoothly as possible.
Author: Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. International Development Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0215080750
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 36
Get Book Here
Book Description
The Chief Commissioner of ICAI has a crucial role in scrutinising aid spending by the UK Government and reporting to Parliament through the International Development Committee. The Committee are pleased to endorse the appointment of Dr Alison Evans to this post, but recommend that at least one of the existing Commissioners be reappointed for a further term to ensure continuity, and that one of the Commissioners be an audit professional. The selection process used resulted in an unranked list of four candidates deemed "appointable" being presented to the Secretary of State for consideration. This puts too much power in the hands of the Secretary of State for an independent scrutiny post and threatens to undermine the candidate in the eyes of the public who may assume that the candidate most sympathetic to DFID was chosen. The Committee recommend that panels for ICAI Commissioner appointments should be invited to rank candidates or otherwise advise the Secretary of State as they see fit. In the longer term, it is recommended that the Committee be able to choose the Chief Commissioner from the list of candidates.
Author: Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: International Development Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 021507078X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 78
Get Book Here
Book Description
Disabled people in developing countries are the poorest of the poor: if we are serious about tackling extreme poverty, our development work has to target them. So while it's good the UK government has brought disability on to the agenda for global development goals (1) - DfID must now lead by example and make effort to ensure the needs of disabled people become a clear and sustained priority going forward within its own development programmes. Despite enormous global advances in education and health since the turn of the millennium, disabled people continue to be excluded from the most basic of services. The Committee calls for DfID to: produce a disability strategy; appoint a larger team responsible for disability; and strengthen reporting processes; show much more ambition in its work with disabled people by targeting them and their needs explicitly; give disabled people a central role in its work; and promote attention to the needs of disabled people including making it an explicit requirement that funding reaches disabled people, especially in disaster and conflict situations where they are amongst the most at risk
Author: Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. International Development Committee
Publisher: The Stationery Office
ISBN: 0215081269
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 64
Get Book Here
Book Description
The number of low income countries is falling. At the same time, the importance of global issues - conflict, climate, migration, trade, tax, financial stability, youth unemployment, urbanisation economic development, and infectious disease - is rising. The Committee argues that aid remains vital for addressing poverty in poor countries, for encouraging economic development, for providing global goods such as tackling climate change, combating diseases such as Ebola and providing humanitarian assistance, but new forms of co-operation have to be developed in order to meet these challenges. This will include new financial mechanisms and facilitating links with UK institutions in a wide range of areas, including health, education, culture, law, culture and science. This will require the Department for International Development (DFID) to put more emphasis on working with small organisations and less on programme management.As the focus moves away from aid, policy coherence for development must be at the heart of a new approach. This means working across Government in the UK, and with global partners in the multilateral system, to maximise the impact on development of all the UK's actions. This approach and changes will require DFID staff to develop different skills.
