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UK aid cuts cast doubt on Boris Johnson’s promise to double climate funding
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The UK government has been accused of breaking its promise to double financial support to poor countries to help tackle climate change.

Climate and aid organisations said the government’s “devastating” foreign aid cuts make its pledge to spend £11.6bn on international climate finance by 2025 “very questionable”.

They warned the proposed £4bn cuts have also “weakened the UK’s moral position” to encourage other nations to increase their climate funding targets ahead of November’s United Nations COP26 climate conference, which the UK is chairing.

It comes as MPs demand a vote on foreign aid cuts in Parliament, with prominent Tory backbenchers like Theresa May and Andrew Mitchell calling for the government to reverse the plans.

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Rebel MPs failed to secure a vote earlier this week, but the speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, called on the government to give the Commons “the respect it deserves” by granting an “effective” vote.

Now, in light of the foreign aid cuts, senior international development figures have cast doubt over the validity of Boris Johnson’s pledges about climate finance contributions.

The prime minister is hoping to use the G7 summit in Cornwall, which starts on 11 June, to “secure a substantial pile of cash” in climate finance commitments from member states. He even phoned his German counterpart Angela Merkel last month, imploring her to follow the UK's lead by increasing its contributions, despite Germany already giving significantly more than the UK.

But experts have now accused the government of “giving with one hand and taking with the other”.

[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/uk-aid-cuts-cast-doubt-on-boris-johnsons-promise-to-double-climate-funding/