Mark chaired a public meeting last Friday at St George's Church West with Douglas Alexander, Secretary of State for International Development, who described his work and stressed the priority that the Government gave to supporting development.

All Edinburgh's Labour MPs were there including the Chancellor, Alastair Darling who introduced his cabinet colleague.

Douglas Alexander began by talking about his early political experiences and the unwitting inspiration that Margaret Thatcher provided when she told the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland that 'there was no such thing as society'.

He was often moving when describing his own personal commitment to international development which was motivated by very different ideas to those of the former Conservative Prime Minister.

Douglas Alexander has been committed to Britain providing an international lead on trade and aid issues.  He highlighted climate change as the key issue facing us in international development as although developing countries are the least responsible for climate change, they are feeling the brunt of its effects through floods, droughts and other kinds of extreme weather.

The need for Western industrialised nations to provide aid and assistance to developing countries in adapting to climate change is an issue that Mark recently raised in a speech at Westminster. You can read what he said by clicking here.

[Mark and Douglas Alexander visiting the Fair Trade stall after the meeting]