International development was, for the wrong reasons, in the news yesterday, on the same day that, for the right reasons, thousands of people in the UK and hundreds of thousands of people globally are continuing to live on £1 a day to raise awareness of extreme global poverty.
The coalition government yet again failed to enshrine in legislation the UK's commitment to spend 0.7% of GDP by 2015 on aid and development. All three major parties are signed up to this target, and whilst the money has been allocated in the recent budget, not ensuring our commitment in law could lead to us rolling back on it in future years. It was not only a pre-election promise from David Cameron, in his attempt to detoxify the Tory brand but it was also in the coalition agreement that this pledge would be made law - despite some serious disquiet from a certain section of Conservative MPs. This has led some within the development sector to wonder if the 0.7% law was side-lined to keep the increasingly grumbling Tory back benches happy post-budget and post disastrous local election results. Whatever the reason it is extremely disappointing, not only for the possibility of the UK rolling back its commitment, but because of the signal that it sends to other countries around the world. So far 16 countries are committed the 0.7% target by 2015, whilst Denmark, Norway, Netherlands, Sweden and Luxembourg long since met and gone above this target.
My day started at 6.30am as I got up to go to the gym, which I do regularly in a normal week, but this was the first time I'd been since I started living on £1 a day. I would usually have a banana first thing before the gym and a big coffee and something full of protein after exercise. This morning I went on an empty stomach and I really felt the difference. Doing physical activity on so few calories was hard, just as walking miles to fetch clean water, looking after your family, working long hours in low-pay with poor conditions, doing any form of manual labour or trying to learn at school is of course all much harder with no fuel for your body.
In the afternoon I realised that after my lunch of chickpeas and tuna, I had actually burnt 100 more calories than I had eaten, no wonder I felt so tired and empty. In the evening I clubbed together with a couple of friends, 'Come Dine Below the Line' style, who are also doing the Live below the Line challenge, we had a meal of tomato risotto, a rich tea biscuit and a cup of tea for 33p per head.
So as I, along with thousands of others in the UK, was demonstrating my personal commitment to the eradication of poverty, our government was failing to demonstrate its long-term commitment to the world's poorest. Not a great day.
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