Corruption In High Places

It is reported that Cameron is to engage in a degree of finger wagging about the trillion dollar corruption industry woven into public life around the world, as part of his contribution to the G7 summit. It kind of looks good on the home media but will have little practical effect, even though all the other heads of government will be obliged to agree.

Unfortunately Britain has unwittingly stoked this pestilence by its practice of paying huge tranches of overseas aid to developing governments whose auditing practices are rudimentary and whose customs make these cash flows fair game for local politicians and commercial interests. If Cameron were to announce that the UK would in future stop altogether payments to governments and instead give the cash direct to the charities or other authorities distributing the aid and encourage other aid giving countries to follow suit, he would deliver a blow to the thieves and fraudsters which would inaugurate real improvements.