Today ICAI published a rapid review exploring what progress the UK has made in developing a relevant and effective aid response to irregular migration.
ICAI found that the cross-departmental approaches to addressing the root causes of migration are still under development and have not yet fully absorbed research findings on the causes of irregular migration. ICAI also identified valuable investment in research, appropriate efforts to shape the international response to irregular migration and promising initial development work on national Compacts.
ICAI has made the following recommendations:
- the UK government should not label development programmes as migration-related unless they are testable and target groups with a known propensity to migrate irregularly
- the responsible departments should invest in monitoring and evaluation methods assessing irregular migration interventions
- the UK response should be informed by robust conflict, human rights and political economy analysis, to ensure that it does not inadvertently do harm to vulnerable refugees and migrants