Oh, it’s a dirty job but someone’s gotta do it
Said it’s a dirty job but someone’s gotta do it
We care a lot!
We care a lot!
We care a lot!

I can put up with a lot. Give me a bloodthirsty medieval monarch or an insane tyrant, but not the public servant posturing.

It’s a grueling and grinding job.

Sir Mark Lowcock has spent nearly 40 years getting critical help to those suffering through a variety of crises: civil wars, famine, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Along the way, he says he confronted an enormous, horrifying catalog of human misery and human brutality toward other human beings.

How does he find the strength to keep on going?

I’ve been blessed with a sunny gene, he says. Unless you are able to see a brighter future, you don’t hang around for decades in this work.

That positive outlook has supported him through his role as the world’s most senior humanitarian official: the relief chief of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, a position he held from 2017 to 2021. His job was to encourage aid groups like the Red Cross and U.N. agencies like the World Food Programme and UNICEF to work together — and raise funds for them to assist those in need.

A brighter future and a very nice salary.

As of 2015, Lowcock was paid a salary of between £160,000 and £164,999 by the department, making him one of the 328 most highly paid people in the British public sector at that time.

 

Also the bonuses are NICE.

The head of Britain’s foreign aid department was handed a bonus of almost £20,000 as it met a target to spend billions more on overseas development.

Mark Lowcock, Permanent Secretary of the Department for International Development, was given the handout last year, the ministry’s annual report for 2013/14 shows.

Despite concerns over whether millions of pounds of aid money were being spent effectively, he received the bonus of between £15,000 and £20,000 on top of his salary of almost £165,000.

Ever modest, Mark has a book titled, Relief Chief. 

Mark Lowcock is the author of Relief Chief, a behind-the-scenes account of his experience as the world’s most senior humanitarian official – the UN Relief Chief. 

It’s grueling stuff.

I had a relatively small amount of money, about $2 billion, that donor countries would give me at the beginning of the year to deal with problems that weren’t being prioritized by the donors. 

Strange quangos lying in offices and distributing other people’s money is no basis for a system of government.