Tories want civil servants sent abroad 'to engage with the poor'

from the Telegraph

By Andrew Pierce

Civil servants sent overseas by the Department for International Development will be forced to swap their city centre hotels for mud huts and tents if the Conservatives win the next general election.

Under the new Tory policy, all officials with the ministry will be required to live with the locals in poor villages - at least for the first few weeks of their posting - so they can experience first-hand the poverty of the people they have been sent to help.

The move comes after the National Audit Office and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development criticised the Government for failing to encourage ministry staff to leave the comfort of capital cities to engage with the poor in rural areas.

Andrew Mitchell, the Tory spokesman on international development, has devised the new policy of "poverty immersions".

He told The Daily Telegraph: "The next Conservative government will introduce a programme of poverty immersions for international development staff. They could involve a week of living with a host family in a poor community, sharing their lives, listening to their stories, and learning from their experiences."

Mr Mitchell led a group of Conservative MPs to Africa last summer on a two-week building project to underline the party's commitment to international aid.

The project became controversial when David Cameron, the Conservative leader, travelled to Rwanda while his Witney constituency was under several feet of flood water.

Mr Mitchell said: "British officials will clearly benefit from such direct, personal, face-to-face interaction with the people they are paid to serve.