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Interview transcript of Claire O’Shea, Head of Hub Cymru Africa by Colette Hume, BBC Radio Wales on the overseas aid cut announced by UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer.
INTERVIEWER: First up, it’s the Prime Minister, who is jumping on a plane to Washington, D.C., later today for talks with President Trump. This follows yesterday’s announcement that the UK will cut spending on international aid in order to boost defense spending to 2.5% of the UK’s national income.
Here’s Sir Keir Starmer.
[PRE-RECORDED] PRIME MINISTER SIR KEIR STARMER: I’ve decided that we will fund the initial increase in defense spending by cutting our spending on overseas development, moving from 0.5% of GDP to 0.3%. I want to be clear that this is not an announcement that I’m happy to make. I’m proud of Britain’s pioneering record on overseas development, and we will continue to play a key humanitarian role in war-torn countries.
INTERVIEWER: Well, listening to that is Claire O’Shea, Head of Partnership at Hub Cymru Africa. The organization supports other organizations across Wales in building sustainable links with groups in Africa and beyond.
Claire, a very good morning to you.
CLAIRE O’SHEA: Good morning.
INTERVIEWER: First of all, your reaction to the news of the cut in international aid? What will that mean for the organizations that you work with?
CLAIRE O’SHEA: It’s an absolute dereliction. The news about U.S. aid being cut last week was devastating, but to be followed up with news that the UK was also cutting its aid budget means that the infrastructure and the groups that usually support the work of the charities from Wales have all but disappeared.
INTERVIEWER: Thinking about the groups that you work with, I suppose it must be difficult to make choices between which of those groups are the most important, most vital? Are there any that stick out in your mind that you’re particularly concerned about right now?
CLAIRE O’SHEA: We’ve been concerned since 2021, when the first enormous cut came to the aid budget by the previous UK Government. Since then, groups have struggled to limp on and continue to do their work. At that point, there was lots of research done that said that women and girls were the ones who suffered the most as a result of aid cuts. So we expect to see that pattern continue, and that’s where one of the biggest areas of our concern is.
But we also know the budget goes to support really important projects that focus on climate change and sustainable livelihoods. There’s concern that we’re no longer contributing to some of the biggest global challenges at the moment.
INTERVIEWER: Sir Keir Starmer, writing in the Daily Mail this morning, says that President Putin’s aggression threatens us at home. He states that our national security must now become a whole-society effort. He goes on to say that this is not an announcement he makes lightly, but the realities of our dangerous new era mean that hard power must now take precedence. The national security of our country must come first.
Sir Keir Starmer says we have to look after ourselves now before we look after anybody else. Is that something that you can empathize with?
CLAIRE O’SHEA: Not entirely. I understand the need for national security. The world is a changing place. But I have heard that we’re not on a war footing or anything like that, so I wonder where the defense budget is going to be spent.
What shouldn’t happen is for the aid budget to be the first budget that gets cut to increase defense spending. Aid is also a tool for security. It’s a tool for peace. It keeps countries that we work with secure. It builds good relationships with countries that we want to have good relationships with. And it delivers real outcomes and improvements for countries that are scarce in resources. We know resource scarcity can be a real cause for war. So the aid budget, alongside the defense budget, should be protected. It’s not the first place we should be looking.
INTERVIEWER: But there will be people listening who will say that in the last two weeks, the world order, as we know it, has changed. We’ve seen President Trump talking about making alliances with Russia. The future shape, size, and strength of NATO are also facing huge question marks.
Europe is having, as we’ve seen from Germany in the last couple of days, to look very carefully at increasing its defense spending. It can no longer, it seems, rely on America.
Are you saying that Sir Keir Starmer has misjudged the situation? Do you disagree with him when he says that national security is one of the most important issues to him right now?
CLAIRE O’SHEA: National security is the most important issue. I think for most of us, living through such turbulent times, it is a key concern. But the aid budget is also crucial in terms of securing global security.
If we create a vacuum by leaving countries, breaking our commitments to them, and diminishing our relationships and our reputation—which has already happened—we create an opportunity for other superpowers to step in. We’ve seen it where China and other large nations build relationships through aid that can sometimes be more transactional. In fact, some Africans in poorer countries suffer as a result because the debt burden is so high.
Ultimately, the aid budget, when delivered by European countries and the UK in particular, has always been about relieving global poverty as its number one objective. We can’t forget about global poverty when we’re talking about defense.
INTERVIEWER: Claire O’Shea, thank you very much indeed.
