Red Cross Blogs

Welcoming the government’s response to the Humanitarian Emergency Response Review

By Nick Young
June 16, 2011 at 11:13 am

At the British Red Cross we cherish and are ever grateful of the public to offer support regardless of any consideration other than the desire to help fellow humans in distress.

Amongst all the factors to be considered in responding to humanitarian disasters – value for money, efficiency, political convenience or national interest – it is humanitarian need which must be paramount above all others.

This is why we welcome the government’s response to Lord Ashdown’s Humanitarian Emergency Response Review (HERR). We support the drive for more efficiency and accountability in humanitarian aid so that the most vulnerable can be helped more effectively.

For example, reducing the need to deploy teams from overseas by building local resilience and capacity to respond is absolutely key in improving disaster response. It’s an approach the international Red Cross Movement through its global network grounded in local communities has championed for years and will continue to support.

We don’t want excessive bureaucracy in a system that must be fleet of foot, but it is right that any funding – whether taxpayers’ or donors’ money – can demonstrate success.

Read DFID’s statement on the Humanitarian Emergency Response Review

Full text of the Humanitarian Emergency Response Review (PDF)

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Tags: disasters, preparing for disaster, resilience

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This entry was posted on Thursday, June 16th, 2011 at 11:13 am and is filed under Emergencies, International. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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