​Labour's Plan to Reduce Global Inequality

As part of  Labour's front bench International Development team, I am proud that this week, our shadow Secretary of State, Kate Osamor launched Labour’s new vision for International Development.
 
In our policy paper, ‘A World For The Many, Not The Few’, we set out Labour's plan for tackling the root causes of global poverty, inequality and climate change. Our paper also commits to setting a second twin goal for all international development spending: not only reducing poverty, but also, for the first time, fighting inequality.
 
Inequality is the challenge of our generation and it is getting worse, over 75% of people in the global South are living in societies in which income is more unequally distributed today than it was in the 1990s. In virtually every city and country around the world, extreme wealth and poverty now co-exist side by side.
 
This growing inequality and widespread poverty combined with climate change is already subjecting millions of people to unacceptable living conditions bereft of opportunity. We can’t stand by and let this happen. The UK must play its part in helping tackle the root causes of these global crises and not just addressing their symptoms, which is the Governments current approach.
 
Our specific policies to help do this include:

• Helping countries that receive UK aid halve the income gap between the top-earning 10% and the poorest 40%.
• Evaluating all development spending against the extent to which it reduces inequality.
• Put an end to the UK’s support for privatisation of public services overseas.
• Promoting alternative economic models and reforming the rules of taxation, trade, debt, and global institutions.
• Developing alternative measures of well-being, alongside economic growth.
• Ending the Department for International Developments investment in fossil fuels and beginning to shift investment to renewable energy sources.
• Considering recent abuses of power and sexual exploitation in the aid sector, begin transferring power away from the aid industry and into the hands of people and communities.
• Tripling the funding for grassroots women’s groups.

 
You can read the full paper here.
 
I am very proud to be part of this plan led by our Shadow Secretary of State, Kate Osamor. However, if we truly want to tackle these global crises, we need to take drastic action. At present, this is not happening, only a Labour Government is offering a vision to do this.