MPs will this afternoon debate a controversial report into the Netherlands’ development aid policy over the eight years to 2006 during which €10bn was spent in Africa.

The report was written by an independent evaluation body known as the IOB, and raises a number of issues about the ineffectiveness of aid spending.
For example, it says that debt cancellation in development countries has had no visible effect on the poor. Nor does increasing education and health care help the poorest in society. And it says, too little attention is paid to productive sectors such as agriculture.
According to ministers Maxime Verhagen (foreign affairs) and Bert Koenders (development aid), who were not in the cabinet in the period covered by the report, things have improved since their arrival, says the Volkskrant.
A debate on the report had been scheduled for July but has been continually postponed, the NRC reports. In addition, the aid ministry has instigated its own report into aid policy which concluded that the IOB report is not to be trusted, the paper says.