NATO colleagues must share the burden, says International Development Secretary.

Douglas Alexander MP

ANDREW MARR: Thank you very much...

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Good morning Andrew.

ANDREW MARR: .. for coming in. We had the Oxfam Report. We've had some very, very grim reports from the Americans.

The Taliban are moving north. Clearly things are going pretty badly out there.

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: I wouldn't actually agree with that description, not least because much of the work on these reports echoes the work that we were actually taking forward in the latter part of last year within the British government ahead of the Prime Minister's statement.

What his statement made clear was yes we have some very significant challenges in Afghanistan. Take development. It's a desperately poor country. Life expectancy's just forty-six.

One in five children die before their fifth birthday. We also face the challenge of the insurgency and counter- narcotics. And that's why it's important that we recognise this is a long term struggle which has to be led by the people of Afghanistan. Much of the analysis of those reports is actually an analysis that's now informing the approach of the British government.

ANDREW MARR: Oxfam said that aid for instance had been slow, ineffective, not getting to the right places and that there was a major change in direction needed if Afghanistan is not going to become a failed state. They have many people out there.

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Sure. The principle critique they offered was that there wasn't adequate coordination between donors. That's something we agree with. That's why we were supportive of the efforts of Paddy Ashdown to be the Secretary General's Coordinator. But at the same time you should be very clear on behalf of British taxpayers that eighty per cent of our money going to Afghanistan goes directly to the government of Afghanistan. It pays the salaries of teachers, of nurses, of doctors.

I travelled to Afghanistan in the latter part of last year and I saw the difference that we're making. Take schools for example. There were just nine hundred thousand boys in education in Afghanistan under the Taliban in two thousand and one. Today there are five point four million children in school. More than two million of them girls. That's real progress on the ground.

ANDREW MARR: Sure. But you go to Afghanistan and there's a lot of Afghanistan too dangerous for you to go and visit. And there's a lot of Afghanistan where that money is not reaching. Now do you accept the argument there is a case at least for trying to do things more locally and not pushing everything through the central government which candidly only has control of small parts of the town.

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: That's exactly what we're doing Andrew. If you recognise that Afghanistan really has a Pashtun insurgency now across the southern part of the country, there's very standard development work taking place in the north of the country, although there's a big challenge in terms of de-mining as well.

But even in that southern belt affected by the insurgency we are sinking wells. We're making sure that roads are extended. A Taliban official who has been discussing with a range of international news agencies the kind of threats that they're facing recognises that the British are making military progress on the ground in Helmand. One of the commanders...

ANDREW MARR: Well are we?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: .. the British commander said to me actually where the roads end the Taliban begin. That's why in development terms we need to be right behind the British government's and the British military's efforts. We've rehabilitated more than nine thousand kilometres of road in recent years within Afghanistan.

ANDREW MARR: We've lost, killed more than forty soldiers. Many more than that maimed. And Hamid Karzai goes to Switzerland, goes to the Davos conference and frankly slags off the British military effort and attacks us. And a lot of people would say why are we helping this man? Why are we giving money to this man if that's the thanks we get?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Well I spoke to Hamid Karzai at Davos shortly after those reported comments and he was determined to make clear that those were not an accurate reflection of either his sentiments or the sentiments of his government.

But Hamid Karzai is the democratically elected President of Afghanistan. The fact he is democratically elected shows that notwithstanding all of the real challenges - poverty, narcotics, insurgency - we are making progress in Afghanistan. And it's important that we continue to support the democratically elected government of Afghanistan ..

ANDREW MARR: You say, you say we're making ..

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: ... in the face of those challenges.

ANDREW MARR: You say we're making progress but the, I mean the poppy crop last year was a third as high as it had been before. Those areas which are not growing poppies seem to be growing marijuana. On the drugs eradication thing things are going the other way.

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Okay, let's take poppies. Previously, up until last year, there were about six poppy-free provinces in Afghanistan. There's now thirteen. More than double the number of poppy-free provinces.

ANDREW MARR: But there's many more poppies being grown in the other ones.

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: I was just about to say, that if you take Helmand, where there has been a significant increase in the number of poppies, that's because although it's a complex challenge dealing with poppies, at its heart is a very simple equation. Where you have law and order and security you can eradicate poppy. And where you have insurgency it's far more difficult.

That's why we have to support not just British soldiers but Afghan soldiers in bringing law and order to those areas affected by the insurgency. But we also need to recognise that in comparable countries like Pakistan, like Thailand, the challenge of getting rid of opium took fifteen to twenty years. This is going to be a long term challenge.

ANDREW MARR: Condoleezza Rice is coming over next week to talk to I think yourself and Gordon Brown and others about this. The Americans are clearly getting very angry about the lack of military support coming from other NATO countries. Is that an anger you share?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Well there are about thirty eight NATO countries represented in the ISAF Mission as it's called in Afghanistan at the moment.

We've made clear to our NATO partners that we do want to see appropriate burden sharing, not simply in terms of the number of troops on the ground, but where those troops are committed within Afghanistan. And that's a matter that my colleague Des Browne the Defence Secretary will be discussing with other defence ministers at a NATO summit in Vilnius next week.

ANDREW MARR: So when the French and the Germans say no you'll be pushing them harder?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Well it's obviously a discussion that we've recognised we need to have with colleagues to make sure that there is appropriate burden sharing right across Afghanistan.

ANDREW MARR: Kenya. Is there anything that we can do beyond wringing our hands?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Well we're working very hard at the moment. My own department has provided humanitarian assistance. More than a million pounds will now be going into Kenya as a result of the terrible violence we've seen in the last month.

My ministerial colleague Mark Malloch-Brown has just been on the ground talking with Kofi Annan. And actually there were slightly more hopeful signs emerging from Kofi Annan's camp over the last couple of days. There's now a timescale over the next couple of weeks whereby Odinga and Kibaki will be talking together. We obviously want to see reconciliation. We want to see power sharing. We want to see real investigations of any wrong doing in terms of the elections.

ANDREW MARR: Let's turn to the domestic scene now. It's been another week of huge coverage of MPs' expenses and scandals and so on. How seriously do you think that MPs have got to take this? What do you think needs to be done when it comes to MPs and their own expenses?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Listen, of course we have to take this seriously. It doesn't help the cause of any of us or any party in politics to be imprisoned by the cynicism which those kind of headlines generate, not unreasonably. That's why I think it's important the House authorities look at the rules existing in relation to MPs' allowances and expenses at the moment.

ANDREW MARR: Do you think there should be total disclosure?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Well we've got a much closer system in Scotland actually. The down side of that, while I personally see merit in it, is that the headlines continue over tiny issues, whether you buy a pint of milk or not. So I think there's got to be ..

ANDREW MARR: Well the headlines ..

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: .. responsibility on both sides.

ANDREW MARR: The headlines continue over ..

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Of course transparency, of course transparency is the way forward. But equally I do think there needs to be a degree of responsibility in terms of how those issues are then covered.

ANDREW MARR: The headlines continue over your sister, Wendy Alexander ..

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Sure.

ANDREW MARR: .. who's been reported to, the Procurator Fiscal is now taking an interest. A relatively small sum of money but again this question of did she properly report everything to the proper authorities?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Well of course there's the matter that needs to be investigated. But as her brother I feel a certain indignation when I read the coverage this morning. Wendy actually contacted the Standards Clerk within the Parliament, sought the guidance of the clerk.

The clerk said these were not declarable. The Standards Commissioner has now changed his mind and freely acknowledges that he's changed his mind. And as a consequence of that has said it's necessary for these donations to be reported. Now in that sense she's done exactly what was asked of her. As soon as the ruling was changed she disclosed the donors and reported them to the parliament. But that's not exactly the impression you would get if you were to read some of the papers today.

ANDREW MARR: But given that it's all over the front pages of the Scottish newspapers ..

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Sure.

ANDREW MARR: .. grim for the Party in Scotland.

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Of course these are difficult headlines that none of us would wish to see. But that's why we've got to allow the Electoral Commission to get on with its job and in the mean time Wendy's getting on with hers.

ANDREW MARR: The Sadiq Khan case. If this is true, if the police have bugged an MP in prison, how serious is that?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: I think it's extremely serious. I was very heartened by the interview that you did with Sadiq where I think he took a very measured and responsible approach to what's an extremely serious matter. And I'm equally impressed that Jack Straw has moved with such speed because I think there will be deep concern on all sides of the House of Commons if these allegations - and they are allegations - prove to be founded.

ANDREW MARR: What about the condition of the Party generally? We've had this report from Progress which is one of the sort of left-wing think tanks saying basically there needs to be a much clearer sense of direction and a much clearer idea about what New Labour is for or you are all doomed.

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: I certainly don't think we're all doomed. I think instead we have to recognise there's two challenges for any government in these circumstances. One is, how do you deal with events that inevitably come up in the day to day business of government. But secondly do you have that longer term plan and that longer term agenda. And I think we do.

Whether it's on issues like social housing - I was in my constituency on Friday. The first question I was asked was about affordable housing for young people. Whether it's about the challenge of making the Health Service more accessible to people given the hours people are working. It's those practical steps, the kind of discipline of the small steps of progress in government that I think actually over time reveals the rhythm and the character of a government.

ANDREW MARR: And yet there has been a sense that you just carry on doing what you're doing. You don't need to be too worried about the Conservatives. Actually the polls show that you should be. That they have got clear messages which are popular, which are resonating. That's what the Progress report says. And in a sense that's common sense isn't it?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Let me make two points on that. Firstly, does the present Cabinet with a younger age profile than in the past have a complacency about the Conservatives? Our experience joining the Labour Party was of repeated defeat in eighty three, in eighty seven and ninety two. So we will never be complacent, either about the Opposition or more importantly about the people of Britain.

ANDREW MARR: So you're sitting there worried about this and thinking about it?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: No. I think we have a respect for the Opposition which means we take seriously the challenges that any government faces. But what gives me heart is that even amongst the difficult months in the autumn what the Conservatives failed to do manifestly was what we managed to do in the latter years of the Conservative government.

That was not just score some goals against the Conservatives, but actually once again make people comfortable with the idea of living in Labour Britain. I don't think the Conservatives have managed to find a compelling story about what Conservative Britain would be like. So sure, there's been a few tough months. But on the other hand I think over time people will realise the Conservatives didn't seize the opportunity. And actually as this year goes on we will press them harder and harder ..

ANDREW MARR: So you don't ..

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: .. to answer specific answers.

ANDREW MARR: You don't agree with Charles Clarke for instance when he says that basically the first part of this parliament has been wasted, the first half has been wasted?

DOUGLAS ALEXANDER: Well inevitably I think there were issues in the first part of this parliament which perhaps Charles didn't agree with but which reflected some of the work we were taking forward in the manifesto. I don't think that time's been wasted.

And I think there's plenty of time in the remainder of this parliament to set out a very clear choice between the kind of minimalist state moving backwards with the Conservatives to a Britain of economic division and a lack of social opportunity. And to a Britain both of social justice and wider opportunity which is what I believe we'll offer the people.

ANDREW MARR: All right. Douglas Alexander for now thank you very much indeed for coming in.

INTERVIEW ENDS

Please note "The Andrew Marr Show" must be credited if any part of this transcript is used.

NB: This transcript was typed from a recording and not copied from an original script.

Because of the possibility of mis-hearing and the difficulty, in some cases, of identifying individual speakers, the BBC cannot vouch for its accuracy

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