Foreign aid fuels corruption - that's the conclusion of Pakistani politician and former cricketer Imran Khan, who has called on the UK to cut aid to his country.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4, Khan said that very little of the vast sums of aid money sent to Pakistani was actually reaching its target, and that aid money serves to prop up corrupt governments.
Reform, not aid, is what Pakistan truly needs, and in a telling statement Khan said "If we don't have aid we will be forced to make reforms and stand on our own feet".
Indeed so, we've said it many times, foreign aid is a barrier to countries solving their own problems to any reform which they may need, it actively discourages long term solutions instead creating a reliance upon short term fixes in the form of Western aid.
If we pay for the problems of the world, if corrupt leaders know that the money from the west will keep on flowing just so long as they have problems, then what incentive is there for change?
In contrast to Khan's insightful comments, and plea with the UK to stop foreign aid to Pakistan, the UK will actually be increasing foreign aid to the country.
Instead of the £140.4million annually we give them now, ConDem will be increasing it £350million annually for the next 4 years.
Strange situation. At a time of cutbacks at home, we can afford to more than double our aid to Pakistan, a country where even one of its leading opposition politicians says our aid does little good and indeed does harm, and spend well over £1billion there over 4 years.
Pakistan, like so many other countries, would be better off without our showering them with vast sums of taxpayers money, even some within those countries are waking up to the fact.
Our aid fuels corruption, and removes much of the incentive for these nations to change themselves for the better and improve the lot of their people.
Foreign aid, set to drastically increase to a total of over £11 billion per year whilst ConDem are in power, represents not only an intolerable burden on the British taxpayer, but also a disaster for many recipient countries.
Britain should have better things to spend our money on - better for us, and better for them.
