Minister says charity must hand over all its information on use of prostitutes in Haiti

The international development secretary has said the government will end funding to Oxfam unless the charity shows “moral leadership” and hands over all its information on its aid workers’ apparent use of prostitutes in Haiti.



Penny Mordaunt said the charity had lied to the department at the time of the staff members’ dismissal by telling them no aid beneficiaries were involved in the misconduct.

She said the reports were “a complete betrayal of the people Oxfam were there to help and also the people that sent them there to do that job”.



Oxfam workers were accused of paying survivors of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti for sex during relief efforts. The charity allowed staff members to resign from the organisation and seek new aid jobs elsewhere.

Quick guide Charities facing claims of harassment and abuse Show Hide Oxfam 87 incidents of sexual harassment were reported by the charity last year, of which 53 were referred to authorities, resulting in the dismissal of 20 staff and volunteers. The organisation is facing allegations of staff involvement with prostitution in Chad and Haiti. British Red Cross The charity admitted a “small number of harassment” cases have been reported. Christian Aid Two incidents of sexual misconduct have been investigated by the charity in the last year, the organisation said. Both incidents occurred overseas. One allegation led to the dismissal of a member of staff; the other did not result in disciplinary action. The Grail Trust In March last year, the Charities Commission criticised the organisation after it failed to report an allegation of child abuse in India. The organisation initially denied the incident had taken place. Photograph: Andy Buchanan/AFP

Mordaunt said the government would cut its funding for the charity unless executives could prove in a meeting with her on Monday that they had the moral leadership for it to continue. Oxfam received nearly £32m from the government in the last financial year.

The charity should immediately hand over its entire 2011 investigation into the sexual misconduct to the appropriate prosecuting authorities and the Charity Commission, she said.

“This is a historic case but it is in some respects still live. They still have information they should be giving to the authorities,” she told the BBC’s Andrew Marr show. “We were not told about the nature of these events. They initially said they were investigating misconduct, and when they concluded that report they did not tell us the nature of these events.

“They did tell the Charity Commission there was sexually inappropriate behaviour, bullying and harassment of employees, but they did not report that to us.”

Mordaunt said Oxfam had told her department “categorically no” when it had asked if any aid beneficiaries had been involved in or affected by the misconduct. Asked if that was a lie, Mordaunt said: “Well, quite.”

Oxfam said it now had a dedicated safeguarding team, a confidential whistleblowing hotline and safeguarding contact point within countries, and a code of conduct that stipulated: “I will also not exchange money, offers of employment, employment, goods or services for sex or sexual favours.”

Play Video 1:01 'I am deeply ashamed' says Oxfam CEO of the Haiti sex scandal - video

Mordaunt said on Sunday that she did not think new procedures alone would be enough to convince her that Oxfam should continue to receive public funds.

“I am going to afford them the opportunity to speak to me tomorrow, but I want to make clear: it doesn’t matter if you’ve got a whistleblowing hotline. It doesn’t matter you’ve got good safeguarding practices in place. If the moral leadership at the top of the organisation isn’t there, we cannot have you as a partner,” she said.

“There are some actions I’m looking for them taking now. If they do not hand over all the information they have from their investigation subsequently to the relevant authorities including the Charity Commission and prosecuting authorities, then I cannot work with them any more.”

More reports of misconduct have emerged since the original report in the Times. Staff who worked for the charity in Chad alleged in the Observer that women believed to be prostitutes were repeatedly invited to Oxfam accommodation there as well.

Roland van Hauwermeiren, who resigned from Oxfam in 2011 after admitting that prostitutes had visited his villa in Haiti, was head of Oxfam in Chad at the time.

The Sunday Times reported that there had been more than 120 cases of sexual harassment or abuse recorded at some of Britain’s leading charities in the past year alone, with the highest number at Oxfam, who recorded 87 incidents last year.

Of those, 53 were referred to the police or other authorities and 20 people were dismissed. The charity employs 5,000 staff and has 23,000 volunteers.

Save the Children recorded 31 incidents – 10 referred to the police and civil authorities – and Christian Aid recorded two. The British Red Cross told the paper there had been a “small number of cases of harassment reported in the UK”.

Former international development secretary Priti Patel said she had been made aware of abuse involving aid workers while she was in post. “There has been in my view, not just a cover-up with Oxfam, there is a denial, a culture of denial in the aid sector about the exploitation and sexual abuse that has taken place historically for decades,” she told BBC Radio 5 Live.

“My former department did not raise this issue with me, I raised it with them through my own investigations and my own research and I challenged them.”