HISTORIC PRESS RELEASE : Call to action on Global Child Poverty to meet 2015 Development Targets [February 2001]

The press release issued by HM Treasury on 26 February 2001.

Chancellor Gordon Brown and Clare Short today called for a global campaign to fight child poverty and meet the 2015 International Development Targets.

Speaking at a conference in London to uniquely assembled global participants – from developed and developing countries, Government and business, NGO and civil society, the UN, UNICEF and UNDP, the IMF and World Bank – the Chancellor stressed the need for urgent action, and for collective effort, with all groups present being individually accountable for what they can do to create stronger international action against child poverty.  He said:

“Over 10 million children will die before the age of 5. 120m children are not in primary school. Each of us as partners must be prepared to make radical changes in the way we act so that the goals of 2015 can be achieved.”

In inaugurating this global initiative, Nelson Mandela said:

“I warmly welcome Gordon Brown and Clare Short’s conference as a start of a new initiative calling for collective action.  And I say to the delegates – find the courage to be bold.”

International Development Secretary Clare Short said:

“One in five of us live in extreme poverty. If we can together coordinate our efforts behind the leadership of developing county governments, we can achieve the international development targets. Only if we all collaborate can we achieve this enormous objective.”

The Chancellor set out a range of new initiatives on education and health:

On education the Chancellor said:

“Today I am pleased to announce that the British Government will create, in Her Majesty the Queen’s Jubilee Year, a fund to help achieve universal primary education in the Commonwealth. The Government will provide new resources for this initiative. We will call on business to support this effort.”

On health, the Chancellor outlined a series of measures :

• A new international initiative to address the devastation caused by the killer diseases – particularly HIV/AIDS, malaria and TB, which are responsible for 5 million deaths a year.

He announced his intention to :

• Introduce new tax incentives for research and development into effective and affordable drugs and vaccines for these diseases, linked to increased commitments by the industry itself.
• Remove constraints in the tax system on donations of drugs and vaccines – linked to increased commitments from the industry to make donations on a more consistent basis, in support of developing countries own health strategies

Details on these measures will be set out in the Budget.

• A new global purchase fund, both to encourage the development and delivery of effective and affordable treatments that do not yet exist, and for the treatments already available.

Gordon Brown linked these new initiatives with a challenge to the pharmaceutical industry – to raise the level of R&D on diseases of the poor, and to work to provide the affordable drugs and vaccines that the world so desperately needs.

The current level of R&D to develop new vaccines yet to be discovered for the world’s killer diseases is inadequate. The international fund for vaccines provides a new approach. Work will now begin urgently to specific and agree the terms of the new fund and to lead a new international crusade to mobilise political will and resources in support of this monumental challenge.

Carol Bellamy, head of UNICEF, welcomed the new announcements on health saying:

“It can help save the lives of children in developing countries by closing the gap, and giving them speedier access, to necessary drugs and life saving vaccines.”

This new health initiative builds on the UK government’s commitment to better health delivery systems.  Since 1997 the Department for International Development (DFID) has committed £1 billion to strengthen primary health care in poor countries.  A report issued for the conference by DFID, the Treasury and the Cabinet Office’s Performance and Innovation Unit (“Forging a New Commitment: Tackling the Diseases of Poverty”) describes the Government’s comprehensive strategy in more detail.

These initiatives and the themes of the conference will be taken forward through a series of international meetings throughout 2001 and beyond – by the UN, World Bank, and the G8. The UK will work closely with the Italian Presidency of the G8, to build on the announcements at the conference today by Italian Prime Minister Amato and Finance Minister Visco.

NOTES TO EDITORS

1. The keynote address to the conference was given by Nelson Mandela and Graca Machel, representing the Global Movement for Children. Other speakers included, in alphabetical order: