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Pauline Latham presses the witnesses, saying: "You're not the victims, it's the women and girls - they're going to lose out as a result of your behaviour."

Winnie Byanyima admits there were individuals who "abused trust and we're deeply deeply sorry for that".

"That lifeline will keep going," she says, "but we must clean up."

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Mark Goldring says that 7,000 individuals have cancelled their regular donations to Oxfam since the Times story broke on February 9th. He says the charity's corporate sponsors are "deferring judgement" until Oxfam has outlined what it's doing to prevent misconduct in the future.

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Conservative Pauline Latham asks Oxfam chief executive, Mark Goldring "how can you justify not reporting these incidents to the Haitian authorities" and accuses them of treating sex workers as "trinkets".

Mark Goldring admits it was wrong not to report to the Haitian authorities but they interviewed the women involved and "no evidence arose they were under 18".

Mrs Latham says the men involved were "predators" and Mr Goldring insists "there's no excusing it".

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Image source, HoC

Conservative Pauline Latham says she found it "shocking" that the chief executive said he was focused on Syria when the Haiti incident arose.

She asks if he can only concentrate on one thing at a time.

Mark Goldring replies it "wasn't my intention" to give the impression he was only looking at Syria but he was given "clear assurances the Haiti case had been well-handled".

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Conservative James Duddridge puts it to the panel that the Haiti scandal is a "potential Ratners moment" for the whole aid sector.

A reference to an infamous incident in 1991 when Gerald Ratner wiped £500m from the value of his own jewellery group, Ratners, with one speech.

Referring to his firm's cut-glass sherry decanters, he said "People say, 'how can you sell this for such a low price?' I say because it's total crap."

Mr Duddridge says that it seems that if it hadn't been Oxfam who had been exposed by the Times it could have been the UN or another charity in the aid sector.

Mark Goldring says he believes that Oxfam has "well developed systems and processes" for reporting misconduct and agrees that "over time there have been stories in the media about peacekeepers, about international aid workers" beyond Oxfam.

He says that if "any good can come out of the horror" it might be that the aid sector can work to "weed it out" by "getting to grips with culture".

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Mark Goldring says he believes all serious incidents have been reported to the Charity Commission, and appropriate authorities such as the police or social services.

He tells the committee the 26 new incidents reported cover "the full range, from very serious to minor".

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Chair of trustees Caroline Thomson tells the committee she's "ashamed" of what happened in Haiti and is committed to preventing anything like this happening again.

Mark Goldring says there is now a safeguarding team and helpline at Oxfam and the charity is seeking more independent support.

The SNP's Chris Law suggests there's "a sense of cover-up".

Mr Goldring replies that a set of decisions were made about how public to go which were "wrong" because "we should have been completely transparent".

He also specifies that the charity did not supply references for Roland Van Hauwermeiren but should have gone further and said there was cause for concern.

Roland Van Hauwermeiren was Oxfam's director of operations in Haiti. An internal Oxfam report states that he "admitted using prostitutes" at his Oxfam residence.

The report also says he was granted a "phased and dignified exit" and was allowed to resign - as long as he fully co-operated with the rest of the 2011 investigation.

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Conservative MP Nigel Evans asks how many new cases have been brought to Oxfam's attention since the first story about Haiti in the Times on February 9th.

Chief executive Mark Goldring says there have been 26 reports made to Oxfam GB, either new incidents or earlier problems that were not reported at the time. He says "we want people to come forward, wherever they are and whenever it happened".

He says that 16 of those 26 cases are international and "range in time-frame from more recent events to long historic events which people did not report at the time".

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Asked if he personally looked at the Haiti investigation, Mark Goldring says he'd been "given assurances it had been handled appropriately" and the "action plan was where my responsibility came in".

One Oxfam employee who had used prostitutes on charity premises had been "dealt with" as far as he was concerned, but he tells the committee: "I deeply wish I would have looked at that report."

Select Committee
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Also giving evidence is Winnie Byanyima, executive director of Oxfam International. She tells MPs she is "ashamed" of what has happened.

She says she has spent her life protecting women.

"This is painful for me," she tells the committee.

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Mark Goldring admits "the central resource was not big enough" on safeguarding, and there will now be a dedicated team of six people working on this but "the bulk of the work will be done on the ground in the countries in which we work".

Committee chair, Mr Twigg asks if there's a "cultural problem" with concerns not being taken seriously.

Mr Goldring tells him "in 2011 we got a serious wake-up call" (after the Haiti incident) and says "we should have acted faster" on issues raised by Helen Evans, Oxfam's former head of safeguarding, but there has been "real progress since then".

Select Committee
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Oxfam chief executive Mark Goldring says that when he joined Oxfam in 2013 he was told there had been "serious misdemeanors" in Haiti in 2011.

He says he was told that "it had been fully investigated and that the investigation had been closed" and that changes had been made to make Oxfam "stronger and safer".

He says he was given "assurances that it was well handled" and that he understood that his job was to "lead Oxfam forwards".

Committee chair Stephen Twigg says the original investigation made recommendations for "better mechanisms" for informing other organisations of "behavioral issues" to "avoid recycling problem staff". Given that staff involved in the scandal went on to work for other aid agencies, the chair asks why such a system wasn't implemented.

Mark Goldring says Oxfam "tried to work on a system of shared notice" but "no sensible and legal way forward was found".

He says Oxfam is now trying to work on a system of "humanitarian passports".

Oxfam has been criticised for the way it handled the allegations of misconduct. The charity's internal investigations led to four people being sacked and others resigning, including the Haiti country director, Roland van Hauwermeiren.

The International Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt has said that Oxfam had failed in its "moral leadership".

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Mark Goldring apologises for remarks made about murdering babies in cots which he made in defending Oxfam.

In an interview with The Guardian, external last week, he said: “The intensity and ferocity of the attack makes you wonder, what did we do? We murdered babies in their cots?"

He says he's "deeply sorry" for that.

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Image source, European photopress agency

10.30am: Oxfam

Mark Goldring, Chief Executive Officer, Oxfam GB

Caroline Thomson, Chair of Trustees, Oxfam GB

Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director, Oxfam International

11.30am: Save the Children

Kevin Watkins, Chief Executive Officer

Steve Reeves, Director of Child Safeguarding

11.50am: Department for International Development

Matthew Rycroft, Permanent Secretary

Gerard Howe, Head of Inclusive Societies

Beverley Warmington, Director of CHASE

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Here are MPs on the International Development Committee.

Stephen Twigg (Chair) - Labour

Richard Burden - Labour

James Duddridge - Conservative

Mr Nigel Evans - Conservative

Mrs Pauline Latham - Conservative

Chris Law - Scottish National Party

Mr Ivan Lewis - Independent

Lloyd Russell-Moyle - Labour

Paul Scully - Conservative

Mr Virendra Sharma - Labour

Henry Smith - Conservative

Image source, Reuters

Reports of sexual exploitation by Oxfam workers in Haiti surfaced on 9th February in the Times. The paper said Oxfam had covered up an inquiry into whether staff had used sex workers during the relief effort after the 2010 earthquake. Oxfam yesterday published an internal report , external - written in 2011 - on sexual misconduct by staff in Haiti.

Welcome to our live coverage of Tuesday in Parliament as MPs return to Westminster after their half-term break.

The Commons and Lords get down to work this afternoon but at 10.30am the International Development Committee starts an investigation into sexual exploitation in the aid sector.

From 10.30am the committee will be questioning Oxfam's chief executive, Mark Goldring and the charity's chair of trustees Caroline Thomson about the conduct of Oxfam staff in Haiti.

At 11.30pm the committee will turn its attention to Save the Children, questioning the chief executive Kevin Watkins and director of child safeguarding Steve Reeves.

Finally, MPs will question Matthew Rycroft, permanent secretary at the Department for International Development and two DfID officials about what the department knew and what action it has taken.