Facts4EU think-tank reveals £12.7bn to be spent on climate change aid for poor countries
Meanwhile, PC Harper’s killers set to go free to ‘make space in our overcrowded prisons’
“Just when you think this Labour government’s Net stupid Zero policies can’t get any worse…” Reform UK’s Richard Tice tells us
Plus, how this news was buried on the best day of the year to make sure it went unseen
Remember when overseas aid was about sending food to the poor, starving people in Africa? Now we’re funding solar panels for them, imported from China. From official data we expose the billions of UK taxpayers’ money going to third world Net Zero projects.
In this shocking report, Stand for Our Sovereignty (SOS), in collaboration with the Facts4EU think-tank and The Campaign for an Independent Britain (CIBUK), – can reveal the huge sums of taxpayer billions that Andy Burnham’s Government is sending as foreign aid for ‘climate change adaptation, mitigation, and finance projects’.
We have shared this special report exclusively with GB News. As always, we recommend clicking their link to get their particular take on this important story.
To provide a sense of proportion, we also show how the sums involved in this Net Zero largesse dwarf those which the Government is spending on the provision of badly-needed prison spaces in the UK.
Photo credit: Acumen
Additionally, Reform UK’s Deputy Leader Richard Tice and former Secretary of State Lord Redwood question the Government’s spending priorities, when its prison building budget is so small it means that PC Harper’s young killers seem likely to go free.
The billions the UK is sending abroad as overseas aid for climate change projects
In its little-known announcement of 24 June this year (2026), the Government talked of two areas of expenditure, known as “International Climate Finance” and “Development Finance for Climate and Environment”.
Below we show the total commitments for this year and the next two years.
UK’s overseas aid for the developing world’s Net Zero projects
How this compares with the investment in more prison places for the UK
The public petition to Andy Burnham’s Government not to allow the early release of the two men convicted in the murder of PC Harper has now reached 1,044,132 signatories.
With this in mind, Independence Facts4EU.Org researched the latest figures for the amount the Government’s Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is spending by way of capital investment on the UK’s prison estate.
The total investment for the year just ended (2025/6), for the entire prison estate including Probation Service buildings, is shown below. As the MoJ was reporting on this, other government departments were confirming the massively-disproportionate new amounts being spent on overseas aid to install, for example, solar panels.
“Just when you think this Labour government’s Net stupid Zero policies can’t get any worse…”
The Deputy Leader of Reform UK, Richard Tice MP,
speaks exclusively to Stand for Our Sovereignty, Facts4EU and GB News
“Just when you think the insanity of this government’s Net stupid Zero policies can’t get any worse, we then discover this, thanks to Facts4EU’s diligent research and GB News’ reporting.
“Quite how Andy Burnham and his colleagues imagine this will go down with the general public is a question for them. They’ve committed an astonishing £12.7 billion pounds for the remainder of this financial year and the next two, to spending money on overseas aid solely for ‘climate change projects’ in poorer countries.
“At the same time, they’ve had over two years to ramp up spending on all kinds of important issues at here home – not the least being enough prison spaces – and to make cuts in spending on things which we can’t afford.
“Well, if ever there were something we couldn’t afford, it’s nonsense like this.”
– Richard Tice MP, 18 Aug 2026
Snapshot of how much more important it seems to be to the Government to spend on solar energy for the third world, compared to more prison places in the UK
- UK ‘Climate Change Foreign Aid 2026/7-2028/9 : £12.7bn
- Capital investment in HM Prisons & Probation Service 2025/6: £1.7bn
The time periods for the data we were able to obtain are different, but the yawning chasm in the commitments show how much more importance the government places on installing solar panels in third world countries, compared to keeping convicted criminals behind bars in the UK.
The Government is spending over 7x as much this year and the next two years on overseas climate change projects as it spent in the latest year on prison and probation buildings.
The Rt Hon the Lord Redwood commented exclusively to GB News, Stand for Our Sovereignty and Facts4EU
“The mismanagement of prisoner release is worrying people and alarming victims, seeing dangerous men set free to roam our streets. The government claims it has to because it is short of prison places, yet there are empty cells in a brand-new prison, for want of staff. Every time a new prison opens, the service shuts down an old one that could be repaired and used for a bit longer.
“The government pleads poverty but they can find billions for Net Zero schemes under foreign aid. Most of us are all for the UK providing help with crises and offering hunger relief abroad.
“We do not think it more important to install Chinese-made solar panels in a foreign country than providing enough prison warders and cells to keep us safe at home.”
Social inclusion and diversity has not been forgotten – quite the contrary
Readers may be relieved to hear that the diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) agenda is front and centre of all the UK’s climate change foreign aid spending.
“We are strengthening the gender-responsiveness and inclusivity of UK climate finance for both adaptation and mitigation, including by increasing the proportion of climate finance that has gender equality as a principal or significant objective”
– Dept for Net Zero, 24 Jun 2026
The Deputy Leader of Reform UK, Richard Tice MP,
had more to say to Stand for Our Sovereignty, Facts4EU and GB News
“Here we are, with the Labour government’s disastrous early release scheme for prisoners convicted of serious crimes. Yet if they weren’t spending billions of taxpayers’ money on Net stupid Zero at home – and now, we learn, abroad too – they could have addressed this and we wouldn’t be facing the prospect of PC Harper’s killers and others being set free.
“The Reform UK government will start on this as soon as we’re in power. Today’s Facts4EU / GB News report is another example of how much there is to do, but we’re ready to get our sleeves rolled up.
“These things are doable if you have the will to do them. We do.”
– Richard Tice MP, 18 Aug 2026
The best day of the year to bury bad news?
Whilst there may have been some in Government who would have been proud to laud the news of its generosity with taxpayers’ money, perhaps wiser heads in Government PR chose their moment well. There will doubtless have been those who realised that in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis, a huge foreign aid story might not play well with most voters.
On the very day the Government’s announcement was slipped out, the UK’s newsrooms were already hives of activity. This was the day of Sir Keir Starmer’s final Prime Minister’s Questions.
The papers were full of this and of Andy Burnham, who had arrived in London that week as “King of the North”. In fact Mr Burnham was soon busy fending off questions himself, about the composition of his upcoming cabinet. This speculation had taken a new turn that morning.
The story of who might become Chancellor grew when the subject of new rumours – one of the Secretaries of State responsible for these aid monies – failed to appear on the front bench in the Commons to hear his boss’s farewell performance.
That man was none other than Ed Miliband, the Net Zero Secretary.
Below is what Kemi Badenoch had to say to Sir Keir about this, across the despatch box.
“In bed with the Mayor of Manchester…”
“The Chancellor isn’t the only person who let him down. The Energy Secretary is putting up bills and killing jobs. He’s not here, is he? He was a failed Labour leader rejected by the electorate, brought back from the wilderness by this man.
“And when the going got tough, he jumped into bed with the Mayor of Manchester. It’s not the first time he’s betrayed someone close to him, is it? But does the Prime Minister think that this treachery should be rewarded by being appointed Chancellor?”
– The Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch MP, Leader of HM Opposition, House of Commons, 24 Jun 2026
“Leaving on a (passenger-light, carbon-heavy) jet plane…”
Finally, as if all of this weren’t enough to deflect coverage of the overseas aid, Sir Keir jetted off on the same day to Berlin, to attend the E5 Leaders’ Summit. There he met German Chancellor Merz and French President Macron to discuss Ukraine. Whilst nothing substantive came of the meeting – which was not unexpected – Sir Keir had his own spending announcement to make:
– Sir Keir Starmer at the E5 Leaders Summit, Berlin 24 Jun 2026
“The UK is ready to implement the largest increase in defence funding since the Cold War.”
[Note: Sir Keir’s aircraft may not have been a jet, but even if not, this was the most globetrotting PM per day in office of any PM in history.]
Lord Redwood’s final comments to us
“The last Prime Minister loved totting up the air miles and the new one wants more travel between No.10 and a pointless second No.10 in Manchester, adding to the CO2 output. Neither seems to grasp that their own Net Zero policies of closing down our industries and importing instead, boost world CO2. Instead of buying solar panels for foreign countries, they should reverse their damaging, high-energy cost, high-energy tax policies.
“Mr Burnham says he understands the public wish to keep dangerous criminals in jail, so why doesn’t he hire the warders we need for our current prisons to use all the cells? Why doesn’t he tell the Prison Service to fix the problems in old jails to extend their lives? Why not rent accommodation for less dangerous criminals to increase capacity?
“If he spent less on badly-directed overseas aid and backed more UK industry, he could both keep the prisoners in and help reduce world CO2. Then the jobs would be here at home, not making solar panels in China.”
Observations
Whenever Stand for Our Sovereignty and Facts4EU.Org has researched the UK’s overseas aid, we have been struck by the number of government departments, quangos and agencies involved. In researching this report related specifically to overseas aid on ‘climate change adaptation, mitigation, and finance projects’, our previous concerns were multiplied many-fold.
We ploughed through interminable reports, mostly containing waffle dressed up to sound important. What came over most of all was that the majority of these people seem to be be being handsomely paid for consulting, advising, and writing over-long reports. Worse still, the reports are full of the most sanctimonious drivel, mostly related to ‘engagement’, ‘inclusion’, ‘gender equality’, etc. In a 70-page report – for which you, the taxpayer, are footing the bill – it can be hard to find any actual facts showing that something useful has been achieved.
We do not often express ourselves so strongly. Perhaps this gives some idea of how out-of-touch we think these legions of the wokerati really are.
About the figures above
Any attempt to quantify the full extent of the UK’s expenditure on foreign aid related to climate change will be incomplete. A large number of government departments are involved in foreign aid, all of whom report separately. Even on climate change foreign aid alone, four departments are involved. Definitions of expenditures vary, and have changed over the years.
We most certainly caution against using AI for this. Facts4EU does not, as a matter of policy based on having run regular tests, use AI. In this case we very strongly recommend going to the source material.
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