Trump's aid cuts could be big mistake - Lammy

Donald Trump's plans to make dramatic cuts to the United States' international aid budget could be a "big strategic mistake" that allows China to step in and further its global influence, the UK foreign secretary has said.

- Pippa Crerar

David Lammy cautioned that Britain's own experience of merging the Department for International Development into the Foreign Office, announced by Boris Johnson in 2020 with little fanfare, was a serious blow to Britain's "soft power" in developing countries and beyond. Thousands of USAID employees have already been laid off and programmes shut down worldwide, including in Ukraine, after the new administration imposed a sweeping freeze on foreign aid, before consolidating the agency into the state department, a move decried by critics as a huge foreign policy blunder.

Aid agencies have warned of a profound impact on the global development sector with a risk of escalating disease, famine and conflict, as the US accounts for $4 out of every $10 spent globally on humanitarian aid. Security experts have said China could capitalise on the move.

In an interview with the Guardian on a trip to Kyiv, Lammy said: "What I can say to American friends is it's widely accepted that the decision by the UK with very little preparation to close down DfID, to suspend funding in the short term or give many global partners little heads-up, was a big strategic mistake.

"We have spent years unraveling that strategic mistake. Development remains a very important soft power tool. And in the absence of development ... I would be very worried that China and others step into that gap.